Wet? You bet it's wet.
As we approach the shortest day of the year, the weather has turned cold, wet and windy. Together with long hours of darkness this has caused much darkening and deepening of the melancholic clouds that surround the MLCMM abode. After several days of rain, I'd had enough, but a break in the weather this morning meant it was finally time to head outdoors and breathe in some real, unfettered air. A week ago I'd done the same, but as a walk with mates from work. Now I wanted to run off-road and clear my head a little of this wintry fuggishness.
Work being done nearby to me on the Great North Walk, a 250km track that runs from Sydney to Newcastle, has greatly improved access, and I was keen to try a couple of new routes, especially one heading north, heading away from the Lane Cove National Park, but largely followng the Lane Cove River until it hits several townships several kilometres away.
With my normally trusty sidekick Garmin Forerunner 405 GPS currently out of action and awaiting repair, I ran naked for once, relying on track markers and my memorisation of the map the night before to guide me through to my destination. As a precaution, I took my phone with me, but only used it once to confirm that I was, in fact, where I thought I was.
I had risen at 7 and was out the door a mere fifteen minutes later to find the world largely hidden by mist. The only real problem this caused was to constantly fog up my glasses, but after a half hour or so the fog had burned off and all was well again.
My usual approach to the Lane Cove National Park has been along the (very) busy Ryde Road, but in recent times I've discovered a back way to the Park which requires only the very briefest of trots alongside the six-lane behemoth, otherwise being mainly quiet back streets and a short section of bush track. Once in the park proper, civilisation quickly vanishes, and despite being, in real terms, very close to subrubia and main roads, all of it is mercifully hidden from sight and sound, instead replaced with lush eucalypt rainforest and the omnipresent, and to me, quintessential sound of Australian rainforest, that being of bellbirds and whipbirds. Have a listen
here, it's completely magical. Despite the cold and wet, running through this sort of bush is wondrous, and I intend to do very much more of it, especially now that better access has been opened up and the tracks proeprly signposted and maintained. I say 'maintained', but they are still rough bush tracks, not conducive to your average Sunday stroll, as evidenced by the fact that I only encountered four other people, walking as a group, in the whole two hours I was out there.
Several days of rain made the run a damp one, of course, but of mud there was thankfully very little. Creek crossings, on the other hand, were a nuisance, and there were four that were impassable other than by wading through the sods. This of course resulted in utterly wet feet, but I seemed to escape unscathed, with cold, wet feet, yes, but none of the feared blisters that usually result from such drenchings.
I was toying with the idea of making this outing a return, out and back journey, but the track was more technical and slower going than I expected, so at the end I opted for a return leg home by bus and train, rather than go through all those creeks again. With a couple of rain-free days the water should recede sufficiently for a return outing to be hopefully feasible.
In short, it was a magnificent outing of about 2h45m. I will have to invest in some decent trail shoes however, as my old ones are
too old, with virtually no tread. Instead I ran in my oldest pair of normal runners, which held up rather well, but were not so comfortable on the rockier ground.
And so, clear of head, and comfortable of leg, I look forward to the next off-road session, soon.
High June
