Hiking With Ben

An hour west of Melbourne is gorge country. Though Ingliston Gorge is small and surrounded by farmland, it manages to retain a sense of isolation and wilderness. Dad and I planned a walk to make the most of what it had to offer.

For our last day in Taiwan we took a chance on the weather and caught a train out to Pingxi, aiming to climb a set of three sharp little peaks in the forest near the town. I wasn’t really sure what to expect, and what we found exceeded anything I’d imagined.

Located in the remote Northern Flinders Ranges, the Gammons are a true wilderness. The best opportunities for walking are in the gorges that provide a refuge from the surrounding desert. But while the landscape has a unique beauty, that comes at the price of the difficulty in finding water.

Back in 1990 Dad and I planned an eight day walk through the heart of the Victorian Alps, taking in as many of the state’s highest peaks as we could. In preparation for this we went on a couple of shorter walks to get in shape: one to The Viking and another to Tin Mine Cove.

The ranges east of Melbourne contain many hidden treasures. This wonderful walk starts in a rainforest valley filled with ferns and moss, and ascends through beech and mountain ash forest to a lonely mountain peak.

Hidden at the southern end of the Bogong High Plains are some beautiful grassy valleys with crystal clear streams, peaceful glades fringed with snow gums, and a magical campsite at the confluence of two rivers.

In the remote country around Mt Clear many peaks share a distinctive banded appearance caused by layers of red rock, while the arrival of summer sets the whole area ablaze with wildflowers.

A knoll in the Whiterock Creek valley provided the base for an exploration of the northern end of the Bogong High Plains and the surprisingly rugged waterfall-filled valleys on their western side.

Langi Ghiran rises out of the flat Wimmera like an island in an ocean of grassland, and enclosed within its horseshoe-shaped summit is a hidden forest filled with ferns and moss.

One of the best daywalks in Victoria is in the Northern Grampians: a thrilling circuit through the rocky wilderness around Mt Stapylton that includes scrambling through caves, crossing ravines, and the spectacular Taipan Wall.