Monday, 4 May 2026
Temp: 5-7.5°C
Distance 4.58km
Up 122m Down 338m
Time 1:17 hrs Moving time 1:15 hrs
11mm rain
Food: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

Current distance walking so far after we left the trail is 135.59km including all the side tracks.

Good morning. After being cold initially when we went to bed at 8.30pm last night. I was in thermals, skins, socks, polar fleece (a last minute inclusion), puffer jacket, beanie, headband and gloves. Within a little while I was toasty and slept soundly on and off for the whole night. I woke a few times but quite easily went back to sleep, even removing my puffer and gloves at some stage. The expected wind gusts were to be 70+kmh, I am not sure if it made that but our tent repairs thankfully held fast. At 7am when I woke it was dry and the weather looked like rain was imminent any minute, so we quickly threw everything into our backpacks and took it down to the semi-enclosed shelter. Then quickly packed up the tent before the rain started. We were successful. Yay!

We farewelled our three musketeer buddies (Paul, Murray and Matt) from last night, who had made the decision to do a double section today from Yarram Camp through to Djardji-djawara camp (26.8km away, up 980m and down 1141m ) via Wannon camp which is today’s usual track destination (11km, up 378 and down 648m). Due to the forecast for the next few days, they thought they would head to Djardji-djawara camp which has an enclosed shelter. Way too far for us in one day.

We tidied up our gear, repacked and enjoyed the semi protection of the shelter. The wind still came in and you needed to keep moving a little. It had been raining most of the morning and you couldn’t see anything, even in the very near distance. The mountains are covered in grey clouds. David hiked 300m up the rocky, steep trail to get an up to date weather forecast. Decision time, we have come up with 2 solutions to the upcoming weather forecasts.
1. See if we can get a Pickup at 3.30pm today on the scheduled bus, 4km (2 hrs) down the trail when we cross Yarram Gap Rd Crossing this afternoon
OR
2. Walk 2 more days and stay 2 more nights on the trail and get a pickup at Cassidy Rd Crossing.
The factors to consider were – you can’t see anything at all in the distance, it was to rain most of the day with only a few hours possible gap, maybe enough time to get to Wannon Camp, probably setup in the rain and stay in the tent, as there is no camp shelter at all at this camp. Tomorrow was a low chance of 1mm rain so it could be ok walking the trail but it is a big 16.3km day. Setup camp at Djardji-djawara which has an enclosed shelter and bail Wednesday morning  at Cassidy Gap crossing at 8am, hopefully before the 10mm of rain forecast, with high winds up to 35kmh for the day as well. Wednesday evening possible small hail, snow at 1100m. Thursday forecast high chance of 6mm rain, small hail and snow at 700m. If we bail today we have 4 days to come back and walk to finish the trail, which is worth doing. If we bail in 2 days with only 2 days to come back to, we probably wouldn’t bother.

As you know decision making isn’t our strong suit, so backwards and forwards we went as the time went on. At 12pm, a decision had to be made as we needed time to get to the meeting point. We decided to see if we could get a pickup today and if we could we would bail today. If we couldn’t we would check the chances for pickup Wednesday morning. And also if they would just transfer our pickup from Thursday to today at no extra cost, as we won’t need that pickup. So up the hill we went and as you can imagine, it was my phone call to make. They had to check if they had someone available to pick us up, as the bus wasn’t running today and then call us back. We stood waiting about 5-10 minutes and they called back. We could be picked up anytime today, so we decided on 3pm, which would give us time to get back down the hill, have a quick lunch and leave by 1pm. So that is what we did.

The hike down was a relatively easy trail with a few steep ups and downs, the rain was intermittent and slowly the view opened up. Maybe we should have continued but the decision is made now. It only took 1:17 hours to get to our pick-up point at the Yarram Gap crossing, so we had 40 mins to wait in the cold. We managed to book a motel suite with a spa (yeehah) whilst we waited. The drive back with Adrian was informative and interesting, as I warmed up on the heated seat in the car. We were back in town at 3pm. We then had trouble with the room we had booked. They didn’t have our room ready, which was okay, we could wait as we had only booked an hour earlier, then they wouldn’t provide it at the cost we were quoted, they wanted us to pay $50 more. On principle, we decided to cancel the booking. We are now staying in a lovely cabin in the caravan park for a couple of nights. We enjoyed a lovely pulled lamb shoulder on ciabatta, with whipped feta, caramelised onion, roasted capsicum, baby spinach and chimichurri sauce. Yummy!

Now to see if we can reschedule the last 4 days before we come home!

National Park notes
Day 10: (S1) Yarram Hike-in Campground – Wannon Hike-in Campground
Start: Yarram Hike-in Campground
Distance: 11.1km 
Grade: 4/5
Elevation: 466m up, 739m down
Names and meanings: Yarram = ‘Yarram’: big. Wannon = ‘Wannon’: may be a corruption of the word for digging stick or boomerang. 
Highlights: Serra Range views, rocky knolls, Mt Nelson (819m) to the west in the Serra Range and wildlife, including night calls of owls, possums and gliders.
Descend and climb knolls and saddles passing through ancient old growth forests and lower swampland plains with stands of native Oyster Bay Pines along the way. Take in views of farmland to the east and south-east that reveal a myriad of swamps, lakes and wetlands and the dramatic Serra Range to the west. Continue hiking the ups and downs of the most southern ridgeline of the Mt William Range, which undulates like a roller-coaster. Settle in Wannon Hike-in Campground for the night in a reclaimed farmland gully. Explore surrounding ridges for stunning sunset views.
Important safety information:
– Rainwater tanks at Yarram and Wannon Hike-in Campgrounds
– Serviced water tank at Yarram Gap Rd Crossing