17/08/1984 – 19/08/1984 Mount Selwyn – Four Mile Hut return
Kosciuszko National Park, NSW
Ngarigo country
Distance: 10km Total Ascent: 255m Total Descent: 255m
Participants: Greg Christlo, Stephen Davies (Report), Debbie Christlo
Friday 17/08/1984
Greg and Debbie Christlo left 8:00pm with lots of traffic heading south following excellent snowfalls during the week. Went via Tarago and Bungendore, only 11km of gravel road but much better than along Lake George as a route to avoid the heavy traffic. Headed out towards Selwyn needing chains up the last hill before Sawyers Hut about 30km from Adaminaby. It was a welcome sight fat 2:00am to find it empty.
Day 1: Saturday 18/08/1984 Mount Selwyn – Four Mile Hut
This route was reconstructed from memory using Google Earth Pro and GPS Visualizer.
Max elevation: 1605 m
Total climbing: 84 m
Total descent: -166 m
Average speed: nan km/h
Still snowing heavily this morning, away about 10:00am. The chains came off as the snow plough had been through. This didn’t make a lot of difference as there were lots of people driving slowly in the middle of the road with them on.
Away from Selwyn around 11:00am, slowly making our way across the 5km or so to Four Mile hut. Snow conditions were excellent and firm on top of the ridge but getting softer and wetter below 1,500m, very difficult to turn on.
Set the tent up with Debbie and I sharing it whilst Greg retired to the hut! A warm night saw me get too hot in the sleeping bag and perspiring, getting the inner sheet damp. I also tried out using a closed cell foam under the thermarest. This proved to be superb, with no coldness seeping through the combination.
Four Mile Hut 17/8/1984
Four Mile Hut 17/8/1984
Navigation Notes: Follow the snow poles which start at the top of the last ski T-Bar just over the hill. After arriving at the collection of signs, head straight down the hill. Follow the old fence line to the gate then the ski pole line which leads down to Four Mile hut.
Food (prepared by Greg and Debbie)
Dinner: Chicken and roast almonds with apricot on rice
Lunch: Lebanese bread with bean spread, tabouli, cheese and pressed ham.
Scroggin Mix: Peanuts, dried apricots, dried banana slices and sultana
Day 2: Sunday 19/08/1984 Four Mile Hut – Selwyn
This route was reconstructed from memory using Google Earth Pro and GPS Visualizer.
Max elevation: 1603 m
Total climbing: 169 m
Total descent: -88 m
Average speed: nan km/h
Was up about 8:30am of porridge with wheat germ. It took us a long time getting ready to leave, packing up the wet tent, etc.
Greg had a visit by a native marsupial during the night. This beast snuck up over the edge of Greg’s bed and pinched some of his food.
The weather largely unchanged from yesterday, with wind to 25km/h and snowing all day and night. The paper later reported about 1m of snow had fallen over the weekend.
We were a little faster skiing out, although Debbie was very slow, it got quite cold waiting in the wind.
We spent about two hours skiing on the downhill slopes but found them rather boring as they are just not steep enough to be very interesting. What a change to several years back when the same slopes seemed really good. The best run I found was an untracked, fairly narrow “chute” down through the trees. Managed some good long-radius telemark turns in the deep snow which was very satisfying.
We left Selwyn about 4:00pm, grabbed some turkey and cranberry sauce toasted sandwiches at Adaminaby before arriving home at 9:45pm via Tarago. I brought home some blistered heals from my boots.
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