28/09/1984 – 30/09/1984 Thredbo – Upper Snowy River return
Kosciuszko National Park, NSW
Ngarigo country
Distance: 30km Total Ascent: 1420m Total Descent: 1960m
Participants: Greg Christlo, Stephen Davies (Photos, Report), Peter Davies
Friday 28/09/1984
Greg arrived for departure at 6:00pm. We picked Peter up from Canberra Hospital, where he was doing a prac rotation, before arriving at a rather full Rutledge’s Hut at 1:00am.
Day 1: Saturday 29/09/1984 Thredbo – Snowy River below Seamans Hut
This route was reconstructed from memory using Google Earth Pro and GPS Visualizer.
Max elevation: 2140 m
Total climbing: 618 m
Total descent: -621 m
Average speed: nan km/h
We counted 25 people in Rutledge’s when we got up and thought we were pushing our luck squeezing into the spaces that were left. One inconsiderate woke everyone up at 7:00am, anyway guess that helped us get an earlier than usual start. We arrived at the top of the Thredbo chairlift at 10:00am.
The weather was very breeze and overcast but the visibility much better than last week. At least we could see across the small valleys to the snow pole lines and see where we went wrong last week.
There was lots of fresh snow around, there had even been 2cm overnight at Rutledge’s where someone had written in the snow on an outside chair “I don’t believe it”. The snow conditions were excellent with the wind causing all of the problems, blowing snow into little patches while exposing icy sections elsewhere.
We followed the snow line up via North Ramshead and Etheridge Range. Over Rawson’s Pass visibility became quite bad. We had a scroggin stop hoping it might clear a little but it didn’t. So the fantastic run down the Snowy headwaters to the site of the former Rawson Hut was spoiled by not being able to see what we were doing clearly. We got some good turns anyway, amongst the falls. We set up camp just below a small cornice which itself was below Seaman’s hut (north side of Snowy River valley) Grid 157 661 (AGD64?)
After 1:00pm we made a couple of trips up Etheridge Range to just below Seaman’s for some telemarking. The snow was beautiful when you avoided the icy patches but negotiating between the two forced some interesting turns. We also headed up the creek towards Moraine Pass between Mount Northcote and Mount Clarke. Very high winds, very cold and very solid crusted over snow so didn’t reach the top of either but got good views toward Club Lake and Carruthers Peak. Sidled around Mount Clarke where we found a section near the bottom with good snow although it was only quite thin. Ripped into this for about an hour getting in some excellent telemarks and parallels. We were back to the tents just before 4:00pm.
Jagungal & Main Range from near Muellers Peak
Peter built a small snow cave. I prepared dinner then Peter cooked it, it was very very cold in Pete’s tent with the door open, even in the down duvet. Lots of spindrift blowing into the tent during this time. Veal Cord en Bleu with steamed vegetables tonight. Cabanossi and mushrooms fried in butter for entree. As the metho was running very low we were forced to skip the dried apples and custard. The sky had cleared and the wind dropped to almost nothing, I thought this was fortunate as I didn’t really want to see how Peter’s tent would handle the wind. The tent was excellent for room. Three packs and people for the night and still heaps of room. Retired at 9:00 pm.
Day 2: Sunday 30/09/1984 Snowy River below Seamans Hut – Mount Kosciusko – Thredbo
This route was reconstructed from memory using Google Earth Pro and GPS Visualizer.
Max elevation: 2203 m
Total climbing: 795 m
Total descent: -1345 m
Average speed: nan km/h
Awoke to clear blue skies and perfect calm. Eureka! We appear be be sitting right in the middle of a high. Had lunch stuff for breakfast due to the metho shortage and used the rest of it to melt snow for drinking water.
Covered up well with sunscreen, zinc, sunglasses and straw hat (now looking a little bit worse for wear), all essential today.
Headed off with the camera up the Snowy River to the saddle between Mount Kosciuosko and Muellers Peak. Spectacular views all around, with the air as clear as it could ever be. The snow cover looking the deepest so far for the season. Bugger, the camera only had a short roll of film in it, so I missed out on lots of photos.
Decide against climbing Townsend (2210m) so ski down towards Lake Albina and the hut in Lady Northcote’s Canyon. Fantastic, this really is what its all about. Telemarked and paralleled very comfortably (with the usual fall or two) and very exhilarating. What a blowout!
Skied back via the Albina shelter where the snow was 3.5m to 5m deep. Back to the tent for lunch after an 8km tour.
Had lunch in Peter’s snow cave as it was too hot in the tent. Tried some tobogganing down the hill on the green closed cell mat, what a blowout! Packed and skied to Seaman’s by 2:00pm.
Peter toboganning on closed cell foam mats
Weather changing again with clouds rolling in and a light breeze blowing. Snow had been getting reasonably soft until then. The first shade from a cloud caught us just as we left camp and began building up very quickly thereafter. I managed a bumpy run on mixed ice and snow, without gloves which I left at the bottom, down the side of Kosciusko while the other two watched on.
Everyone got in a bunch of turns on our return trip in the softer, wetter snow. Arriving at Top Station at 4:00pm. We dumped our packs onto the lift and had a ball on the way down telemarking and paralleling to about 200m below middle station from where we walked, as there were long lines of people waiting to descend via the lift.
Had Peter back in Canberra at 8:30pm and we were home before midnight. Concluded SPF 6 sunscreen was inadequate after my face was burnt, lips cracked as a result of the weekend’s weather.
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