South Coast Track - Day 1

Melaleuca Airstrip to Point Eric

The track from Melaleuca to Point Eric is normally a pretty straightforward, flattish, 13 km walk on a combination of duckboard and good track.

The problem for us was that the only way to get to Melaleuca is to fly and you are somewhat dependent upon the only airline that flies there, Par Avion. In our case the flight was originally scheduled to depart Hobart at 2:30pm. We then got notified that due to “weather conditions” the flight had been pushed back and would not lift off until 3:30pm. The problem with a later departure is that you still have to complete the 13km walk before dark. The recommended walking time for this section is 3 to 4 hours. (I strongly suspect our flight was delayed for profit maximising, rather than “weather” issues, since there was a large group ready to come out when we landed, that probably would not have been ready an hour earlier.

Having done this walk before, I knew it could be completed in less than 3 hours. When John and I did the walk in 2002 we walked this section quite quickly to make sure we were in camp before a predicted storm rolled through.
As it turned out we started walking at 4:40pm and it took us just over 2:30 hours to walk to Pt Eric. We got in about 7:15pm, still with 40 minutes of light to set up tents, have a quick look around and get a cup of soup on the go.

Day 1 - Hill Profile

The hill profile above looks a bit daunting but the high point here is only 69m, which hardly had us breaking stride as we walked from the airstrip at Melaleuca towards the coast.

At Par Avion waiting for departure. Our packs and our bodies were weighed for the trip, with David noting that, being lighter than the rest of us, he was in fact subsidising fat bastards like me.

The Other Plane

There were two planes flying to Melaleuca, this twin engined plane and a single engine plane. John got the twin engine, with others, while Paul, David and I had to settle for the single engined plane.

The Single Engined (less safe) Plane

Here is our student pilot loading David's and my bags onto the single engined cessna that was going to take us to the Coast.

After the walk we were told that Par Avion trains a lot of pilots. This is our pilot, who was a student. There was an instructor in the 2nd seat up front.

The console and the instructor

Here is an inside shot of the plan and the instructing pilot.

The plane was very noisy so we all wore headsets. We had no microphones so we could only communicate by pointing.

Paul and I sat in the middle seats with David behind in the back seats. John was in a different plane.

Me in our Cessna.

The 45 minute flight to Melalueca is pretty scenic. I sat on the left hand side of the aircraft and had good views of the Huon river.

Now in the Wilderness

Having taken off from Cambridge Aiport in Hobart you first fly over suburbia, which ultimately gives way to farms, then logging and then the Southwest National Park.

Federation Peak

This is Federation Peak with Lake Geeves in front of it. Taken from Paul's side of the plane.

Melaleuca Airstrip (also known as Bathurst Harbour Airstrip) is located in the remote south-west area of Tasmania. It is 460 m long and has a white gravel surface that you can see here from my side of the plane.

This twin engine aircraft was faster than our single engine and had landed before us. The container and a small shed is the only infrastructure at Melaleuca, aside from an old buidling associated with Tin Mining.

We were just about to start walking.

Register and Gas

You are not allowed to carry gas on the aeroplane so you pre-pay for your gas cylinders and they are given to you after the plane lands. There is a log book here that you complete before you start the walk.

This is the start of the walk, across the airstrip to pick up a track marker on the other side.

Cox Bight will be home for the night. There are two camp sites in Cox Bight, Freney Lagoon and Point Eric. We went to Point Eric which is about 1.5 km past Freney Lagoon. This shortened the following day. In 2002, while at Point Eric there was a hairy nosed wombat wandering around and it would have been nice to see its grandkids (but we weren't that lucky).

John and Boardwalk

This photo was taken just after setting off and shows some nice new boardwalk making the walk quick and easy.

New Harbour Range

The track to the coast was quick with good quality duckboarding and tracks. In the background here you can see the New Habour Range. The track sidles the bottom of the range on the left (east) presumably high enough to keep it out of the swamp.

This is Paul on the boardwalk.

This is a track marker where the trail splits. There is a minor track from here that heads SW towards Wilson's Bight.

Freney Lagoon is behind Cox Bight and there is a spit of land between the two that takes us to Point Eric

Freney Lagoon and Cox Bight

Here, you can see Cox Bight in the background, Freney Lagoon in the midground and David heading towards them in the foreground.

Paul and Snakes

These are the best type of snakes to see on the South Coast Track. Paul was very generous with his snakes.

This is David with Freney Lagoon and Cox Bight in the background

Just about to decend onto Cox Bight and walk along the beach to Point Eric.

You can see Point Eric clearly in this photo, just above David's head.

Paul and Cox Bight

It doesn't look like it here but the surf was rolling in quite strongly and it was pretty noisy.

Cox Bight and Black Cliff Hills

This is us, walking along the beach at Cox Bight towards our campsite at Point Eric. In the background are the Black Cliff Hills which we walked around to the right (south).

Here are David, Paul and John walking along Cox Bight on what, mercifully, was quite compact sand.

We arrived at Point Eric campsite at 7:17pm.

Freney Lagoon Campsite

This is the entrance to Freney Lagoon Campsite. We kept on walking to the Point Eric Campsite. All the campsites were marked similarly to this.

Here are Paul and David at Point Eric. As you can see it is getting dark, but the tents are up and the cooking has just started.

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