FJCC Does The Spanish Steps

SPANISH STEPS

After being MIA on FJCC trips in recent history, it finally came time for me to once again participate in an amazing adventure. This trip was only a short one, to navigate a closed off track in the Newnes area known as The Spanish Steps.

I decided to go up the day before, and camp at Black Fellows Hand Rock for the night, because camping is my thing. I got up there nice and early which was lucky because the highway closed off shortly after I passed through due to a large bush fire that was coming very close to the road.

MEETING

Early on Saturday morning I started back down the track towards our meeting point at the Zig Zag railway. By the time I got there, there was a whole lot of FJ's sitting in the car park. It was QUITE a site!

After the normal FJ discussions, we set off back the way I came. The track was very dusty, so visibility was quite low. I would use this as the reason for a slight navigation issue, however our leader was the only one NOT eating dust!

After quickly getting back on track, we eventually came to the top of The Spanish Steps.

We all took it in turn to look over the first drop off and explain how capable our FJ's were, and how we wouldn't have any issues!

We set off in small groups with several very capable people doing the spotting for us. There were the inevitable bangs and scrapes as we dropped over the large steps, and eventually made it to the bottom. Once at the bottom, we traversed along a closed in track, across a small creek and then...we had to go back up again!

The ascent was very different from where we had just come from. The rock face we had to climb was much less stepped, but still quite steep and a very good challenge for everyone. We all managed to get up, some with more attempts than others.

Once off the track we continued on to, yes you guessed it, Black Fellows Hand Rock, right were I had started my day! After we all enjoyed a casual lunch, we drove back on to the bitumen and headed to Lake Wallace where we squeezed all the FJ's into a group photo.

Thanks go out to all the spotters, and to SydneySally for organising the very friendly and successful FJCC outing.