Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

Chris Green has sent a report on FOBIF’s Tarilta Creek walk. We thought we would post this as well as the previous Tarilta Creek report especially as Chris has included some terrific photos. 

A Foray into Tarilta Creek

Eight intrepid walkers, led by Jeremy Holland braved a frosty Castlemaine morning and made our way through sunny clear-air to our start point on Sawpit Track 2.5kms NE of Lalgambuk (Mount Franklin).

The walk was a 14km circuit initially heading NE along a section of the Goldfields Trail through ridgetop woodland. We then traversed nor-westerly, via moss floored tributary valleys with numerous clearwater filled pools and glistening waterfalls, finally reaching the substantial Tarilta Creek. This creek has beautiful grassy flood-plain clearings and large trees. We followed beautiful Tarilta Creek upstream for about 4 kms, involving many interesting slippery creek crossings. As the creek became narrower, with more exposed bedrock our path required negotiation of steep scree slopes and occasional fallen trees. The circuit was completed via vehicle tracks over shallowly undulating country through open woodland to our cars.

The highlights of the walk were many, and included:

•  The verdant moss-filled gullies, peppered with gems of fungi everywhere.
• Tarilta Falls with its amazing display of anticlinal structure and deeply sculptured cave formations.
• The abundant crystal, clear water holes and streams, a legacy of recent flooding.
  The tranquil grassy floodplain-clearings along Tarilta Creek with giant gum trees, some maybe a 100 years old.

We noticed:

•  the almost complete absence of historic gold mining activities;
•  overgrown, historic access tracks probably made by timber cutters decades ago;
•  the increasing gorse, as we approached the headwaters of Tarilta creek;
•  and the deeply incised central channel with in the Tarilta Creek floodplain (probably an adjustment to the landform within the last 200 years).

An overlay, on this walk was being witness to a large-scale ground-hugging mist phenomena.

We had noticed from the highest point lookout along the walk, a strange dense mist to the NW, seemingly near Lake Cairn Curran.

On our return drive home looking west from the northern slopes of Mt Franklin we saw a strange looking ground-hugging cloud formation.

On approaching Guildford we became swallowed up by a dense mist sitting in the low lying Loddon River valley floor. The air became clear again on approaching Castlemaine. But a few minutes later, Castlemaine became engulfed in the same dense mist.

Inspired to see this mist from above, the writer headed for summit of Mount Tarrengower near Maldon at sunset to witness an amazing site.

A lake of choppy white cloud spread across the landscape with areas of higher ground rising as dark silhouettes.