Ubajee walkers' camp – Our first overnight hike

 

We finally did it.

In September of 2010 Margot and I finally managed to get enough gear together to head off for our very first over night hike. It was wonderful…….mostly.

We selected the beautiful Sunshine coast Greatwalk as the perfect location. Our thinking was, hike in and hike out and not too far so that if anything went wrong or our new gear didn’t quite work out we were not too far from help.

After pouring over maps and studying the DERM website we decided that the Ubajee walkers' camp suited our needs.

So we prepared and prepared, dehydrated, packed and very excitedly headed off for our first overnight hike.

Day one started at Mapleton Falls National park.

The hike kicks off through some absolutely beautiful rainforest. The first kilometer or so is an Australian grade 2-3 walk so there were a few day trippers but it didn’t take long and we were on the grade 4 track and into the hills of the sunshine coast hinterland.

Rainforest opened up into Picabeen palm forest with low ferns and then back into rainforest again. There are many very large felled trees that remain from the logging days that are now just ghosts of once great monsters now covered with a brilliant green moss.

After a couple of hours of taking our time and enjoying the peaceful and tranquil environment we decided to try out my new acquisition, the MSR Pocket Rocket stove and have a cup of coffee.

The stove worked like a little beauty. Only a minute after firing it up we were enjoying a much needed caffeine fix and listening to the birds and frogs next to the glassy stream we had selected as our morning tea spot.

We continued on after a shortish day of about 12 kilometers and before long we were selecting our site for the tent and cracking open our afternoon tea and putting the stove on for another cuppa.

Unfortunately it wasn’t to stay that way and our first night away turned into anything but peaceful and tranquil.

Find out why in my next post………