The Stirling Range Ridge Walk is a 26-kilometre, three day, one way, alpine hike. When our group parted ways a third of the way along the trail, I was not disappointed in our decision to turn back. It was a daunting trek, even for experienced expeditioners. It was where they trained the special forces for the Australian army for God’s sake. Six months later, when Andrew and I caught up next to exchange our stories after that point in which we split up, confirmed that.
A 180-page pictorial guidebook, Mountain Walks in the Stirling Range- Part 2, contains the most comprehensive description of the Stirling Range Ridge Walk available. It’s also out of print, and the publisher’s webpage states it’s sold out. I found a copy in the resource section of the State Library where I was able to pour through it in a eerily quiet, and windowless reading room. A photocopier was unavailable, but this was in 2018, so I took photos of the illustrations with my smartphone, and took notes in the traditional way. I wondered if the state Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC), who managed the park, had conspired to ensure the guidebooks scarcity? It's no secret they don't encourage hikers attempt the trail, due to the frequency they have to perform rescue operations evacuating unprepared, inexperienced interlopers. Either way, maps of the ridge walk are available in crude forms online that can be printed out, but are somewhat unreliable. GPS coordinates found online can’t be relied on either, in one situation indicating Andrew was nearly half a kilometer away from his actual location.
To be clear, the Stirling Range Ridge Walk, as a trail, is ephemeral. There are trails up there, and some will take you where you want to go, but many are simply dead ends where over time, hikers have discovered their error and turned around seeking the correct route. Over time these wrong turns have turned the thick yet short, alpine, vegetation into a labyrinth of goat trails. Like a chest high, wild, garden maze. You also won’t find markers or signs except for a handful man made rock formations known as cairns. The park authorities are also responsible for the missing signs, again as an attempt to dissuade hikers from attempting the trail. The carns, literally small piles of rocks, were built by the hikers themselves. On the bright side, we wouldn’t need to worry about snow.
We set out on the ridge in January, which was the peak of the Australian summer. The intense, dry, heat dehydrates bodies incredibly fast. Hikers are encouraged to take three litres a day on most multi day trails that have fresh water sources available for cooking and resupply. In the summer, on the Stirling Range, water was rarely available. The ridge walk was not only more physically challenging than most other hiking trials, you need to carry all the water you intend to use for the three days it typically takes to complete. For the rest of the year, when the seasons provided more rain, one known water source is sometimes reliable, however the weather is outstandingly unstable, as alpine hikes are prone to be. Vicious rain storms, thick fog, blinding snow storms, and golf ball sized hail stones, can come from nowhere. Beautiful in the morning and deadly by the afternoon. Unless you are near one of the caves on the ridge, hikers are entirely exposed. Andrew was carrying a whopping, eleven litres of water.
Day 1: Bluff Knoll.
On a long weekend, the park manager confirmed with my wife, Rebecca, and I, his primary occupation is turning away visitors from the overfilled parking lot which acts as the trailhead. this is a popular tourist destination. It’s possibly why many who complete the Ridge Walk start at the other end. Our plan was a reasonably easy, in-and-out hike. An overnight on the ridge seemed ample excitement at the time. We hadn’t been on a long hike in around six months and didn’t feel as though we were in tip top shape.
Starting out from the packed parking lot, we said goodbye to our Land Cruiser and followed the trail down slightly before climbing to the highest point on the range. Bluff knoll is only 1100 meters tall, yet is the highest point in the relatively flat south west Australia. It’s popularity likely due to it’s impressive form as seen from the the parking lot below, a starkly vertical and barren rock face jutting 265 meters out of the surrounding hills. Its foreboding presence makes it a destination for skilled rock climbers from around the world. The bluff is actually the highest point of James Peak, named after Western Australia's first governor in 1828, James Stirling, who settled the colony that would become Perth simply to prevent the French from doing it first. It's difficult to say whether the French would have better or worse to the indigenous people than Stirling, who had genocidal tendencies towards them.
After around three hours, along a very well maintained and purpose built trail - more or less a staircase - a sudden, powerful wind hits us shortly before we reach the top of Bluff Knoll. It’s entirely exposed at the summit and the sweat on my body chills instantly. Two days later, back at our park campsite, the ranger would tell us stories of rescues he had to make on the busy stretch to the peak. He made two on that day alone. Usually minor injuries such as broken toenails and twisted ankles, but what that strong wind reminded me of was the more serious evacuations that become required further along the ridge. Hypothermia was not uncommon due to hikers underestimating the exposure of the ridge. An end to end is not for the timid hiker.
We take a break at the top for a snack and enjoy the impressive view. Eventually we met up with Andrew that would complete our party of three. We had only just met the afternoon before, in the park’s only official campsite. Andrew was struggling to use a rock - rather than a hammer - to pound in his tent stakes, and so I offered him mine. A brief chat revealed we both intended to do the ridge walk starting the next morning. Only, he was planning a through hike.
Ninety-nine percent of hikers do not go beyond Bluff Knoll. They turn back down the long rocky stairs, to the overcrowded parking lot, after taking in the dramatic view. Rebecca, Andrew and I were all happy for more company on the ridge, and besides, Andrew seemed very knowledgeable of the trail.
Six months later, back in the library, the guidebook describes the top of Mount James. The East Bluff is hidden from the crowds, behind Bluff Knoll, and is separated by The Chasm, a short and steep saddle that makes for a creative photo opportunity. Another, more gentle and wider saddle, brought us to East Peak, before we begin a hairy decent in which we would all be following different paths, never sure if any one was correct, and backtracking often. In the guidebook’s words: “Tracks along the ridge are vague and scant”.
We awkwardly scale down a three metre rock face while I try to suppress my anxiety over the precariousness of the situation. Of being at such an elevation, searching for a trail and not being able to see the ground a metre in front of you through the waist high thicket. I found relief only through frustration and cursing at our entanglement. Pushing through the vegetation was like wading through a waist-deep river, trying to move upstream. Living snares grabbed hold of our legs and most frustratingly, our packs, threatening to pull us back, and down, like an upended turtle.
It was an exercise in leadership. No one particularly wanted to take the lead and risk taking us off the trail once we had found it. On previous hikes I would take on this mantle simply because of a life long fondness for maps, while Rebecca seems to have a type of direction dyslexia. Maps wouldn't help us anyway. We used our elevated position to work out our location by visual markers - it was the trail itself, we couldn’t find.
Still, the scenery was continually outstanding. A faint glint was visible that came from the Southern ocean eighty kilometres to the south. North of us, a patchwork quilt of sheep paddocks and grain fields. The cultivated land was clearly distinct from the protected land that was the park. The former was the colour of oatmeal, pale, like bones bleached by sun, and time. The park, by contrast, was a rich olive green. That was the colour of the eucalyptus trees. The difference was stark.
The guide book spends little time on the three low, round, flora-fury peaks between James Peak and Isongerup Peak, aside from noting how easily they are negotiated. I could only assume when the author made the hike the brush wasn’t as thick. Desperately pushing through - mainly on the correct path - the overgrowth so thick we couldn’t see our feet. Our destination appeared to me after a sharp descent into the saddle before the long climb up Isongerup Peak. I all but threw myself down the slope in an effort to breach the tangle that reached a crescendo just before we found our destination. Plants here had more purchase, and nutrients were richer in the in the lower sections of alpine soils. Suddenly the frustrating, short, thick, brush was gone. An isolated grove of eucalyptus trees appeared with the undergrowth cleared away. I shouted back to Rebecca and Andrew, who I couldn’t see but could hear struggling behind me, the news of my discovery, and one after another they emerged from the thicket, as if from the depths of Joseph Conrad's Congo. Expressions of disbelief and wonder filled our faces. It was an oasis of shade where we would pitch camp for the night.
Day 2 (Andrew): The Arrows.
The next morning we exchanged contact information and said goodbye like so many hikers on a popular trail, and now Andrew’s focus was on following the trail. For some hours it actually looked to be easier than the day before. Beyond our camp in the Mallee grove, the trail climbed up a broad, steep ridge to the top of Isongerup Peak at 994 meters. The flora naturally became shorter, hunkering shrubs in defiance of the ferocious wind that drives into the ridge.
As the guidebook surmised, he easily negotiated the rounded peak trail before descending into another col. Another, more prominent, grove of alpine sheoak trees appeared, providing welcoming shade and protection from the wind. It was four hours since he started out that morning, departing paths with Rebecca and I, when he realized he had found another campsite. Logs for seats surrounded a fire pit. A symbolic feature in the heat of summer when the southwest of the state is a tinderbox and fires are banned.
“This is where I should have set up camp on the first night.” Andrew tells me, smiling with his awareness of hindsight, when we talked about it later. I nodded and we both understood what that meant. My leadership led us to stopping immediately upon discovering the first sheltered tree grove. I was frustrated with the unexpected overgrowth and upon discovery of this haven of shade, insisted we form camp very early in the afternoon. He needed to continue on in order to finish the ridge walk. Now, I wish I'd tackled the next big peak and made it to that beautiful site. But that's fucking hindsight.
Andrew was considerate and laughed while recapping this. He admitted none of us knew what was beyond that spot I'd chose, and it was reasonable after the difficulty we'd had with our short hike in. I took the role of leader by default. When I offered up my humility he waved me off and said I'd made the correct move to declare camp when I did. Andrew admitted it was his mistake not to push on by himself, regardless of where Rebecca and I set up camp. Both of us knew better though, without having to say it. Acknowledge it. Decision making errors like that can be dangerous, and we both made one that afternoon.
With determination Andrew pressed through the trees and out into the presence of the First Arrow - one of three technical peaks in a row. A water barrel was meant to be located in a cave located at some incredibly challenging location to access. It was supposedly installed by those training special forces servicemen sometime between 1957 and 1990. According to Andrew, it is also where you will need a bit of a aptitude for heights, which I, do, not. Rebecca, who is as surefooted as an Ibex, laughs at my legs’ inability to function properly when near an unprotected ledge.
Andrew’s final ascent included some exposed scrambling to which he commented, “you wouldn’t want to be doing that in poor weather conditions... I can’t even imagine how someone going in the other direction would try to descend it.” The guide book would confirm that in its description of the climb down the First Arrow. “From the peak, hiking towards the trees [Andrew had walked through earlier,] only three hundred meters away, should take around an hour[!]”
The rest of Andrew’s day continued with losing the trail constantly, just as our first day went, only he was climbing multiple peaks with steep, exposed cliffs at every wrong turn. The thick brush would lead him once to coming within a metre of walking straight off a cliff edge. Descending the third arrow, the sun was getting low and Andrew had not been able to find the trail for some time when he discovered his Camelbak was suddenly dry. He was left with a single litre of water he kept as backup.
The ridge walk was dry except for the mysterious barrel, which Andrew was unable to find. That’s when he made the tough decision to descend from the ridge rather than continue on. It was his best chance to find more water. In the setting sunlight he could see a fire road - a rough cut road built by fire brigades and municipal workers. It was running parallel along the ridge, he estimated about five kilometers away, and made up his mind to abandon the ridge and walk toward there. "Going forward would not be survivable. I will dehydrate." Andrew found himself shortly thereafter clamoring down incredibly steep terrain, made up of loose rocks below a thick layer of leaf litter. This was not one of escape routes the guidebook recommended:
Apart from the starting points at Bluff Knoll and Ellen’s peak, the two other points at which the ridge walk can be exited are from First Arrow down to the North Mirlpunda track, and from the Moongoongoonderup ridge down to the North Isongerup track. Neither of these are easy escape routes, but they are the only ones that should be considered.
There are freshwater streams emanating from the range peaks year round, and when Andrew finally came across the one he had been particularly seeking, he found it flowing with fresh, clean, water. He guessed to be three kilometers from the start of his decent when darkness was looming and he was forced to set up camp while still on a terribly steep slope. After successfully setting up his tent, Andrew resigned to a near sleepless night pushed tightly up against its nylon, lower edge.
Day 3 (Andrew): Stirling Range National Park.
Andrew confided to me that it wasn’t really the risk of dehydration that convinced him to evacuate the trail when he did. It was the possibility that his decision making capabilities would be compromised while he was extremely thirsty. I agreed. We were all fit and healthy, and no doubt would be capable of the thirteen kilometer walk back without passing out from dehydration. But the discomfort of not having water for a day, while exerting ourselves on the trail, could easily lead to dodgy decision making. And that can be a killer.
The guidebook describes the trail Andrew lost between The Arrows and Bakers Peak with little fanfare. Head towards a small, but distinctive rocky outcrop, and the trail skirts around the peak on the north side. More difficult than it sounds when wading through waist high dryandra and honeysuckle. Round the ridge of Bakers Peak and follow the saddle towards Pyungroorup Peak that tops out at 1061 meters. Again, skirt around the north side of the peak, above the bluffs minding the short exposed section (scary!). From there is the final climb after another saddle to Ellen Peak at 1012 meters, before winding down the eastern end of the ridge. When you find the fire road, it’s just thirteen, flat kilometers, back to the car park.
Andrew and I confided during our catch up months later that we were pleased not to have startled a tiger snake in the brush we were blazing through, but his solo adventure would reveal encounters with hawks, echidnas, and emus. The pair of echidnas in particular, Andrew would speculate, had never encountered a human before, given their unusual fearlessness in his presence.
Day 2 (Rebecca and Myself): Back to the Bluff.
Rebecca and I were prepared for our return hike with a more stoic attitude, and plenty of earned respect. After all, we had one last day before the relative comfort of an air mattress in the back of the Land Cruiser, covered by a canvas canopy. The trail we should have descended yesterday was more obviously seen from the long approach below. While Rebecca weaved through the brush, favoring her bleeding shins from the day before, I kept a close eye on where I expected the trail to be when I got there. It was a constant exercise in spotting landmarks around the trail from a distance, memorizing its position relative, and comparing where I was leading us to those points. I shouted with euphoria every time the trail appeared where I expected it to be. It was like passing GO in Monopoly and receiving two hundred dollars.
Now confidant we were making our way up the correct route, it was evident of even this supposedly simple section’s precariousness. The trail weaved around gorges suited for use by the rock climbers. I pulled myself up the incredibly steep climb to James Peak by grabbing a hold of small, sturdy, alpine tree branches. Rebecca followed me as usual without an air of complaint, but always silent, conserving her breath. The guidebook confirmed to me, for its entire length the trail favored the northern exposure of the ridgeline, the steeper of the two, presumingly for the thrill. The most famous mountain range in the park was shaped like breaking wave. The south ridge is where you sat on your surfboard and waited for another. You ride the break on the north ridge.
When we made it back to Bluff Knoll it was as if we’d never left. A gaggle of gleeful yet exhausted tourists still populated the summit just as they had the day before, totally ignorant of the wilderness just beyond the next ridge. We were bedraggled. We were spent. We felt as if we had visited the heart of darkness, and we were bemused by the tourists around us. It was extraordinary that just a few hundred metres from this famous place - a place that’s sought out by people from around the world - such a wild and pristine area of nature exists. That, I realised suddenly, is why I liked it. Most travellers make such a long journey to reach a destination, and I wanted to go further. Even, if only, just a little further.
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