Friday 19 May 2023 Lake Yarrunga Day 4: Monarch to Tallowa Dam

It's 7.15am on our final morning. A mixture of our campfire smoke and mist swirl over the water as the first rays of sun hit the gorge wall. 

Only having a short paddle ahead of us today meant we were in no rush to depart and so enjoyed a long leisurely breakfast sitting around the fire. Around 9.30am we started to pack up camp. 

About halfway through the irksome task.

With camp packed up the next job was to get the gear down to the boats (without going A over T) and load them up. That done, it was time to put out the fire and have a last look around camp before heading off.

One last look up the Gorge while waiting to give L a shove.

At 12.35am the last of us back out of camp with time

for one last pic before we head back down the gorge under

clear blue skies on another perfect autumn day.

No GoPro today, so just a few pics along the way.

Once again the reflections entranced

Around 2.00pm we pulled into Tom's Gully (I think its called) for 30 to 40 minutes for some lunch. As it consisted mainly of remainders it was an interesting mixture - a bit of salami, scroggin, some manky mars bars that had been on way too may hikes with G without being eaten and some beef jerky that had been suffering the same fate as the mars bars and was only 6 months past its best by date and finally a couple of by now, rather battered mandarins.

We then paddled the remaining 2.5km back to the picnic area, arriving at 3.15pm. 

Happy little campers after 4 days of glorious paddling.

Unlike our previous trip in March and in the years before that, our camping experience was critter free - no rat raids, no possums breaking into tents or trying to prise open hatch covers on the kayaks, no goannas wandering through camp AND no mozzies.

We got back to Kangaroo Valley around 5.00pm to find it much busier than when we left. After checking back into Wildes (Due to the hot water issue, G had arranged a great deal for another nights stay) it was 'we're going to wash that smoke right out of my hair' all round. We then went for dinner at Jing Jo cafe for a highly enjoyable dinner and evening. We were the last to leave. Eventually taking the hint as the restaurant was getting cleaned up around us, with fully tummies, we waddled back to Wilde's to collapse into very comfortable beds. Bliss

Lastly, a big thank you to KT for allowing me to use some of her fantastic photos for the blogs of this trip.

Trip Notes:

See Wednesday 17 March 2023 entry.