Mons Sex Millia - 21 march 2015

Uncle Roddus Tramping Diary: Tramp No.156

Mons Sex Millia - 21 March 2015

Mons is a great viewing point near the Lewis pass, overlooking the southern entrance of the St James Walkway. On a pleasant and warmish Saturday a whopping group of three trampers converged at Amberly before the long drive up to the Boyle River. Lots of slapping occurred as we donned boots and gaiters as the sandflies honed in on us and feasted. We headed off along the dirt road until the top of the first rise where we briefly followed a rough vehicle track to the creek before a bush bash up the start of the ridge we decided to take to take us to the tops. Topo map indicated the lower slopes of the ridges to be free of large vegetation but the reality is that there is considerable regrowth on these lower slopes and so the first 300 odd meters of climbing involves bashing our way up through quite tall ferns and other regrowth which was quite exhausting and slow going. We took well over an hour to clear this stuff after which we rested on a nice flat area and refueled before the rest of the slog upwards. After 3 hours we had reached just under the 1400 Meter mark and decided it was time for lunch. The rest of the climb took us up to point 1741 which we made in much better time. The wind on the tops was quite brisk, as predicted, being a good westerly, although not freezing, it was still cold enough to don jackets and gloves. We decided to stay off the ridge because of the wind and followed some old earthquake scars on the northern side as we approached Mons Sex Millia. Had another break between points 1725 and 1675 and admired the tarns dotted below, spotted a deer further along the ridge staring back at us and soon made the tarn just below the object of our destination. We summited Mons about 3:30pm, took the obligatory photos and hunkered down out of the wind to enjoy the awesome views. The route back down was on the nearest ridge and was pretty straight forward except the last 50 meters down the the road where we encountered a wall of Matagari, there was blood. The only thing left to do was head back along the road to the car. According to my GPS route we walked 16.3KM and climbed 1702 Meters in 8 hours 50 minutes.