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Mid Week Adventures (Main Range NP)!

I thought I’d start off with my mid week adventures in Main Range National Park with two of my Brisbane friends, Mel and Hannah. Mel and I work for the same company and had both Wednesday and Thursday off, a rarity in the retail industry. We decided to celebrate with an overnight camp and day hike in the nearby Main Range National Park part of which is World Heritage Listed. The chosen campsite was Spicers Gap Camping Area and the chosen day hike was the Mt Mitchell track (around 10km return).

We decided to camp Wednesday night at Spicers Gap and drive the next day to Cunningham’s Gap for the Mt Mitchell Walk. We left Brisbane around 1.30pm and were planning on a stopover at Queen Mary Falls beforehand. However our stomachs got the better of us and I turned down a road leading to the Lake Moogerah Cafe. Turns out this was a good idea as Lake Moogerah was visually beautiful. I would also recommend the Lake Moogerah Cafe as the food there was super tasty! We stopped here significantly longer than expected and didn’t have time for Queen Mary Falls. Got to the campsite around 4ish and did a happy dance as we were the only ones there.

Lake Moogerah

Now for our first mishap of our adventure. There was miscommunication between Mel and myself about sleeping bags and sleeping mats. Mel had requested to borrow a sleeping bag from me and I thought she had her own sleeping mat. Earlier in the day I received a message from Mel saying that she had a spare sleeping mat for Hannah and therefore didn’t need one from me. Therefore I only needed to pack one for myself. Turns out I was supposed to pack one for Mel and also turns out that Mel had forgotten her spare sleeping mat for Hannah. So I was the only one with a sleeping mat that night with a forecast of 4 degrees, was going to be a long night.

Spicers Gap Camping Area was pretty nice. The only facilities were a reasonably nice drop dunny and wood bbqs nearby. Would’ve been nicer if it weren’t so windy. We set up the tent and all our sleeping gear, or lack thereof, and chilled out in the tent for a while till we got hungry as we were still full from our lunch out at Lake Moogerah. Poor Hannah. Without a sleeping mat and with a sleeping bag I’m pretty sure she’s had since she was 12, it was not going to be a comfortable night for her. We urged her to layer up but this wouldn’t do much with the cold ground and an inadequate sleeping bag for 4 degrees. It was windy too. I however am aware of how cold my body gets during the night so I layered up in my merino thermals, poly pro thermals, tracky pants, merino socks, merino mid layer jacket, neck warmer and gloves in a toasty warm down sleeping bag on a toasty warm sleeping mat. About 7pm we started cooking dinner a meal of veges in the fry pan with bread. A lot tastier than it sounds but I can’t be bothered going into detail about our dinner. It was yum and that’s about it. We cleaned up and sat back in the tent. I slowly drifted off to sleep but around 2am I woke up with the tent being blown flat on top of me. The wind had picked up and made the surrounding trees sound like giant crashing waves. I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. It usually takes me a day or so to get used to new sleeping conditions but other than that I was toasty warm and comfortable. No reason really to not sleep properly except that I just didn’t.

It was a slow start the next morning as all three of us struggled to get a decent night’s sleep. We drove up to the Governor’s Chair Lookout which was a great way to start the morning. On the way back down we stopped at Moss’ Well and had a good chuckle. We were expecting a large and inviting fresh water spring but turned out it was more like a freshwater puddle. Still laugh thinking about it. We stopped on the side of the road to cook breakfast as it was the only spot in Queensland that wasn’t blowing a gale. After breakfast we drove back to the Cunningham Highway for the Mt Mitchell walk.

Myself (front), Mel and Hannah at Governor’s Chair.

The walk up seemed to take forever. To me it shouldn’t have taken that long but I had to slow my walking pace down significantly to accommodate the other girls. Don’t get me wrong the vegetation was forever changing which made it interesting but I was tired and just wanted to get to the top. It was an easy walk with the promise of a decent view from the top. And Mt Mitchell delivered. Awesome view overlooking the Cunningham Highway to the east and the Range over west. We stopped up the summit for a good hour for lunch before we made our descent. I’d recommend the walk for anyone with little to moderate fitness that wants to train for longer walks. There are a few good photo opportunities too along the way.

The view from the top looking south-east.

After the walk we were considering driving to Queen Mary Falls but that would’ve added an extra three hours or so and it was already 2pm so I was like hell no, I need sleep! The drive home was difficult to stay focused so I was mentally pinching myself the whole way.

Overall it was an awesome mid week adventure and I can’t wait to explore Main Range more. And thanks to Mel and Hannah, you were both super troopers!