Drive into Mitchel Falls

Saturday 14 July 2013

Mitchell Falls

We were all awake by 6am and had a hearty breakfast of sausages, tomato sauce and toast along with coffee.  We did a repack of the ute and left behind all those items we would not need to take into the falls. We like many campers are totally reliant on the honesty of campers in leaving our trailer behind. Rather than lock it up we decided to leave it all set up as if somebody was living in it. The unwritten rule appears that you do not walk through another campers space as if there is an imaginary boundary around the site. We decided to take a tarp as well as the stretcher, Paul’s tent and the generator and fridge. It was a tight squeeze in the ute but we managed.

The road into Mitchell Falls had been graded but it was still a cattle track. The 79km took us 2 hours to drive sitting at 30-40kph. People talk in driving times as opposed to distance. For the three of us it has been a big adjustment. We reached the falls at around 11am, paid our fees of $7pp, found a suitable camping site and then set up. The idea was that Robert had the stretcher and would sleep under the tarp, Paul would sleep in the tent and Lindsay would sleep in the ute on the front passenger seat. We had an early lunch comprising a cold sausage with bread and sauce. We added to this by having a sardine each on a piece of bread. We had no way of heating up water so no cups of tea or coffee.

We set off for the falls, unfortunately during the hottest part of the day. We had allowed 5 hours for the round trip which was a total of 10kms. On the walk in we past Little Merton Falls – quite picturesque and then Big Merton Falls – simply stunning in its appearance and height of the falls. We continued until we came to the top section of the Mitchell Falls but we could not see much so we continued on for another 500m before we reached the top of the Mitchell River. We could see the helicopter landing site and people being flown in as well as those catching a ride out. Others were swimming in the upper section of the falls. We had to cross the river before we could view the falls so shoes off. The water was not deep but very rocky and slippery so we all had to take extra care. After asking somebody we found the track to the viewing area where we could view the four levels of the Mitchell Falls. Absolutely stunning – no other words to describe it. I sat up top on the rocks eating a Stirling orange and reflecting on how lucky we were. We sat in the area and viewed the falls for some time before walking back to the upper falls and going in for a swim. It was stinking hot so the swim was invigorating. We found a small fall which had a circular current which kept you from being pushed downstream . We sat in under the falls and got pummelled by the waterfall – it felt great and kind of like a water massage on the back. We had a lot of fun in the pool. Unfortunately it was time to leave and we headed back to the camp in the late afternoon heat. We got back around 4.30pm all feeling very hot. Rob had a touch of dehydration and drank copious quantities of water to rehydrate. The lemon cordial never tasted so good.

Campsite King Edward Crossing

Chicken curry- King Edward crossing

three amigos

Mitchell Falls

Little Merton Falls

One of the lens had dropped out of Rob’s prescription glasses when we first arrived on site so we decided to search for it starting with a walk back to the entry gate. We had tied off the tarp to the ute so we could not drive down. Not sure where 3 old buggers found the energy to do this but we did it – no luck with finding the lens but Rob found it later in his backpack. He realised that it must have fallen out when he placed his glasses in the pack. We thought it quite funny to see him walking around with one lens in his glasses and him not noticing it.

For dinner we had the cold mince, snow peas and tomatoes. And yes we had a special treat that night with the chilled tin fruit salad and long life cream being brought out of the fridge. Rob thought that the cream was off as it was a bit lumpy but once he saw that Paul and I were hoeing into our portions he quickly changed his mind and joined us. We also were in the mood for a game of cards after dinner so it was Sevens. Of course LR was the winner of this bunch of very competitive blokes. We were in bed pretty well stuffed from the day’s activities.