Wanderings

Attempted the Uni Rover Trail (Kanangra to Kowmung return) on a somewhat cooler day after Christmas, but unfortunately did not finish.

I turned back near the top of the main descent to the river (Lannigans Spur, around 860m altitude). I’ve seen other posts mentioning similar, and knew going in there was a reasonable chance of this.

The first 6km of the trail was mostly easy, but it then began to alternate with tougher sections consisting of large groves of regrowth and fallen trees. Around Mt Savage, the difficult sections started to dominate. Somewhere between Hobnail Hill and Mount Lannigan, it becomes almost a constant bush-bash where the only option appears to be to push through. There were a lot more vines here than in the earlier part of the walk, and it was getting pretty tangled (1km/hr pace). While normally I would not encourage this, a small pair of secateurs may be necessary for some of the worse vines.

I was hoping that on the spur, the vegetation might thin a little, but all I could see in front was another wall. While I was confident I could still (slowly) finish the 2.5km to the river, I was more concerned about the walk back up the next day (a hotter day), and water levels if anything went wrong.

Next time, I’d drop/cache more water/drinks along the way in preparation for the return journey, or consider continuing on over the river to Batsh Camp. Overall it was 33km return and mostly just a lot of scratches to show for it. But will try again soon.

The photos show some of the less overgrown parts of the trail.