A couple of weekends back, owing to another dodgy looking weather forecast for the coast, we converted our rock climbing plans into snowshoeing plans.

It was a bit last-minute, and we were already committed to dinner for Ange’s birthday on Friday night, so it had to be a shortish trip. So on Saturday morning we got up as early as we could bear, and drove to Thredbo.

After suiting up down in the car park we lumbered over to the chairlift, feeling rather over dressed for the valley weather. Up on the mountain there wasn’t a breath of wind, and with the sun blazing down we were still over dressed.

We made good time on the snow shoes from the chair lift up to roughly the Koscuiszko lookout. Given our late starting time the snow was already quite slushy, which makes for harder snow shoeing, but it was still great fun.

From the lookout we contoured around to the east of Etheridge Ridge, possibly not the best decision given snowshoes awkwardness on sideways slopes. Still it was warm and the views were awesome, and by 5 or so we were at Seaman’s Hut.

After a bit of scouting we found a nice camp spot between the rocks behind the hut. It was a top spot, though on further inspection it came to be christened the Bog Rock camp site, good thing every thing’s frozen 🙂

Soon enough we had the tent setup and a cuppa on the stove. After a little walk around the rocks we got dinner started, and were all fed and watered before sunset. As the sun dropped so did the mercury, so we quickly hit the sleeping bags and settled in for the night, spying the last rays of sun through the tent window.

We both slept pretty well, or as well as you can when it’s -5º outside and you’re entombed in a sleeping bag. Neither of us was cold, even though our condensation was freezing inside the tent inner, so our -10º rated bags are at least good for -5º.

The sunrise was awesome, starting with that purple bruise over the horizon then lighting up the mountains with a gorgeous red glow. I took stacks of photos between trips back to my sleeping bag.

After a leisurely breakfast and pack up we were on the road before 9. During the morning some clouds had blown up to the west and the wind was picking up, so we decided to walk back across the Snowy River valley, rather than via Rawson Pass.

With the snow still frozen the going was brilliant, and we were at the river in no time. We wanted to pay Opa a visit but couldn’t quite find his spot with all the snow, but we were close by anyway.

Morning tea was taken on a rock outcrop at the top of Merritts Spur, with great views back to the main range and down to the Thredbo valley and beyond. We did a bit ‘sploring around some more rocks, just to fill in time really, we didn’t want our little adventure to end too soon.

Still we were back at the top of the chair lift well before the 4pm closing time, and after a short trip through the air were back in the land of ice cream and cars.

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