Leader: Joanne Armstrong

Berowra Valley NP: Great North Walk overnighter: Thornleigh to Cowan

7/8 September 2019

An 80 leaders walk

Photos Joanne Armstrong

Participants:

Joanne Armstrong, Janette Allan, Anthea Michaelis, Glenn Draper

Walk description:

Pack walk along the Great North Walk following Berowra Creek to Crosslands then via Berowra Waters. Mostly good bush track with some fire trail. Will collect water at Crosslands and continue on to Lyrebird Creek to camp. A number of ups and downs with maximum ascent 220m. Map: Hornsby, Cowan

Report:

The previous day had wild weather- in fact I had to pack for the walk in the dark on Friday night as my suburb had no power- so Saturday was still quite windy and the track had lots of branches across it to climb over or go around. The track was also very busy with it seemed every high school Duke of Ed group walking to Crosslands - at one stage it was literally bumper to bumper backpacks! And while it was great to see lots of young people enjoying the bush, we were glad they all camped at Crosslands so we had the Calna Creek campsite to ourselves. Some of us had trouble putting up our shelters/tents with the strong winds which seemed to pick up just as we reached the campsite. Luckily it dropped overnight.

Sunday was a truly glorious day. We didn't run into any “Duke of Ed-ers” on this day so we moved quickly and we even had time for a coffee at Berowra Waters. Luxury! The climb out of Berowra Waters was very enjoyable with some great rock scrambling- it was my favourite part of the hike. We were also very impressed with all the wild flowers out- especially in the section just before Cowan. We were back at Cowan Station just after 1pm.