Leith Hill - unifinished business

Shanti reports…

A few weeks after Mum and I did a recce on the Leith Hill Loop Track at Castle Hill Village we picked that for a team walk. The forecast said it was going to be hot (as in 27 degrees Celsius hot) and windy. Most of the loop track is through forest, so it seemed like a good plan for a short scenic walk on a hot and windy day.

We had a pretty start to the day. Mum had suggested an (not necessarily popular - even with her) early start because of the hot weather.

Once on the track we discovered that the forecast was right about the wind - it sure was blowing - but not about the temperature. It was probably below 20 C… so after a quick consultation, when we came out of the forest… we were heading up Leith Hill.

Maisy was way ahead on the track below the scree and looked quite confused for a while - saying the path DOES go here!

Us dogs are always up for an adventure so up we went with no complaints. It got windier and steeper the higher we went. At first through mostly scrub and rocks and then scree. Instead of aiming for the top, our humans aimed for an outcrop of rocks towards the top. Perhaps they thought it might offer some protection from the wind.

By the time we got to the outcrop, there was the odd spit of water from spillover rain from the Main Divide coming down - and our humans decided to turn tail and head back down. It was still a fair distance to the top, and the wise decision was made to return when the weather was better.

Dropping down over steep scree. That’s Castle Hill Village just below the trees in the distance.

Dropping down was much faster than going up - especially for Mum who is slow on the uphill and turbo-charged on the downhill.

This is us back on the official track below the scree - we were almost on top of all of that!

We followed the loop trail back to the car… and got to see where we had been. It looks pretty impressive if you ask me.

The arrow shows the outcrop we walked to…

The official track goes below the scree and the “Here-ish” text shows more or less where we got to before turning.

When Mum got home she looked up the route on one of her favourite sites an found that people RUN the route. I think I’m secretly kinda glad Mum isn’t crazy fit like that.

Here’s me on the trail, because there aren’t that many photos from this trip…

And this is the route we did according to Mum’s GPS - a lot of up - but there was still more to go!