21/06/1985 – 23/06/1985 Guthega Power Station – Whites River return
Kosciuszko National Park, NSW
Ngarigo country
Distance: 22km Total Ascent: 1030m Total Descent: 1030m
Participants: Greg Christlo, Stephen Davies (Photos, Report)
Friday 21/06/1985
We departed Dapto at 4:30pm encountering very little traffic along the way. The Bungendore to Tarago road has recently been sealed except for about 2km. We had patchy rain most of the way down but were greeted with clear skies on our arrival at Island Bend.
Day 1: Saturday 22/06/1985 Guthega Power Station – above Whites River Hut
This route was reconstructed from memory using Google Earth Pro and GPS Visualizer.
Max elevation: 1782 m
Total climbing: 644 m
Total descent: -189 m
Average speed: nan km/h
The usual start sorting gear, having breakfast and repacking gear. We had considered walking up to Disappointment Spur hut last night but were not sufficiently well organised. It being a moonless night also a negative.
We left the power station about 10:00am with a party of three from ACT. The snow started from about half way up the spur. Dropping in at Disappointment Spur hut for morning tea we were visited by a marsupial mouse. From here we were forced to make fresh tracks all the way to Whites River hut.
We set up camp near the creek about 400m past the hut where we had lunch. There was 100% cloud coverage throughout the afternoon but with very little wind it was really pleasant. The skiing was enjoyable on a cover of excellent snow. A good cover with nothing of any concern exposed.
Snowcamping above Whites River hut 22/6/1985
All the telemarking techniques from last season were remembered straight off.
For dinner we had sweat and sour vegetables with cabanossi and mushrooms and scones for dessert.
Day 2: Sunday 23/06/1985 Above Whites River Hut – Guthega Power Station
This route was reconstructed from memory using Google Earth Pro and GPS Visualizer.
Max elevation: 1983 m
Total climbing: 388 m
Total descent: -850 m
Average speed: nan km/h
An excellent day with not a cloud to be seen but extremely cold at about -14C. The waterbag and wine-bladder were frozen solid overnight and although left in the sun all day they still did’t look likely to thawing out.
We were skiing confidently and well despite the usual high fall rate. The snow was excellent early before becoming a little crusty as the day wore on.
A short trip to the first trig revealed some icy patches and a cold breeze. We knocked off a couple of good slopes. Managed to link four turns together on average before becoming unstuck.
From Dicky Cooper Trig 22/6/1985
We left as late as possible, dismantling camp in record time (about 30 minutes) for a 3:30pm start back to the car, arriving at sunset around 5:30pm.
Skied most of the way down with great style considering the lack of manoeuvring room and being on a thin cover. This required some hard stop telemarks and parallels along to negotiate.
We had only encountered five other people out skiing the whole weekend nor was there evidence on the snow of others around either. Greg had us back to Dapto by 11:00pm.
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