2022-08-25 -36 145

Location

In Reef Hills State Park, near Benalla.

Participants

Stevage
KT

Expedition

The approach

Steve's lane!

KT and I were setting off for a snowshoeing adventure across the Razorback. As we drove up the Hume, I idly checked the geohash app.

First glance: the pin was directly on the Hume Freeway! Zoom in. Still on the Hume! Zoom in. Still on the Hume! Eventually, I could see that it was just a few hundred metres south, within a state park. Perfect! Game on.

We turned down Warrenbayne Road, one of those roads that cross the Hume Freeway, that we have all seen so many times, but perhaps never visited. Like Alexandersons Road - does everyone else wonder how that one got its name? In this case, I remember having had a powernap on Warrenbayne Road once, coming back from some other trip. I was much too alert for that this time though!

Left onto...Steves Lane! Seriously. Wow. You get your kicks where you find them.

Fleeting glory

Fleeting glory!

Soon the mighty Yaris was parked 50m from the hash, so we got out, and strolled immediately to the point. Success!

We tried to imagine why anyone would camp here, as we noticed a campfire a short distance away. The sound from the nearby freeway was horrendous. HOW'S THE SERENITY? I wondered.

We could now go back the way we came, or, more interestingly (and, as it turned out, dangerously), continue through the park.

We drove on, along the dirt track, dodging a few potholes and some alarmingly large puddles. Each time there would be a huge puddle, but nearby, a new track that enterprising drivers had carved out through the bush. One of the puddles we drove straight through without thinking too much of it.

The puddle that thwarted our initial escape.

Until eventually we encountered a puddle so big and wide there was no getting around it. I got out to examine it more closely, and reported "That looks like a one way trip to Bogsville". (No, I really did. I'm not normally as witty in person as I am in my write-ups, but I did actually say that.)

We turned around, retracing our tyre prints.

Soon we encountered a huge puddle. I was pretty sure we hadn't come through anything this big. KT thought we had. We quibbled. We discussed different ways around it. We started reversing. There was communication. There was miscommunication. There were different plans. Forwards, backwards, into the puddle, not into the puddle, over into that dry bit over there. Oh crap.

Disaster strikes!

Digging...

Suddenly we were stuck in a ditch. We got out to have a look. It looked...kind of bad. We got back in. Spun the wheels. Now it looked definitely bad.

We tried to put chains on the wheels to add traction. Now we had a tangle of chains on one of the wheels as well!

We let down the tyres to add more traction. Now we had flat tyres as well!

We pondered our options, and decided to seek help at the camp fire we had noticed before. It was only a 5 minute walk.

We strode in. "Hello! We need help!"

An uneasy acquaintance

A gruff voice came back, "Wait, let me put the dog away before she attacks you." And so we met Cane. (Or Cain? Or Kane? Or, as I usually called him, for no good reason, Cole).

Cane was...a character. Bald. With tattoos on his head. And a fierce gaze. We tried to break the ice. "What's your dog's name?" "I can't tell you that."

We told him about the boggage. He offered, in his way, to come and look at our situation.

After assessing the situation from the front, he offered his opinion. "That's fucked!"

After assessing the situation from the rear, he offered his qualified opinion. "That's really fucked!"

He looked under the body, where the car was beached in the mud. "That's totally fucked!"

He looked on the front again, where the steering arm for the wheel was beneath the thick clay. "Nah, that's fucked!" He paused. "I should have brought me shovel."

So we went back to get his shovel. To pass the time, we talked about various country towns, and got his take on each of them.

Shepparton? "Full of shit." Cobram? "Full of shit." Benalla? "Full of shit." The people? "Cunts."

But we got the spade. A tiny little spade. But better than what we had, which was a stick.

The work begins

Chocking...

He told us where to dig. So we dug. Knee deep in muddy water, we dug. Kneeling in the clay in our clean new pants, we dug. Elbows and faces covered in mud, we kept digging and scraping.

He told us to fetch rocks and wedge those under the wheels, so we did that too. And sticks. And branches. When it was finally time to try driving the car again, he watched while we drove and pushed, then patiently offered his assessment: "That's fucked!"

We had called RACV, who said their service of helping get cars out of bogs didn't extend to unsealed roads.

We had called a bog extraction company who offered to come immediately and extract us for $330.

But Cane reckoned he had a mate who could do it cheaper. But first he wanted to try cutting down a tree and using that to lever the car up out of the ditch. He went off to get his chainsaw, while we noticed that it was well after midnight, we were tired and cranky, hadn't had any real dinner, and maybe would think about it some more in the morning.

We eventually went to return his shovel and go and camp somewhere, when we found him on his way back, chainsaw in hand, with a gift pack of firelighters, eggs, and...wet wipes. He went into slightly too much detail about the value of wet wipes to the camper, then led us to a very specific spot where we should camp. We thanked him, then immediately chose another spot.

A visit from an angel

Free!

It didn't matter. In the morning, he came and found us, and told us his mate was on the way, and it would cost us $50. By the time we were up and back at the car, a miracle had happened. The car was back on the road, with a long ditch gouged out of the track.

And no sign of the guardian angel, but his messenger informed us which servo we needed to go to pay our $50. Once we had limped to the nearest servo in order to reinflate our tyres from really flat.

KT makes a friend.

We made friends with horses and cows, then had brunch in Benalla, glad to have seen the last of Cane. But oh no. As we wandered about, exploring the sights, we bumped into old mate once more. He seemed to have really taken a liking to us by then. Enough to feel comfortable. Too comfortable. Oh Cane, why couldn't you have just kept it in a bit longer?

His last words to us: "It's a good thing you weren't <racial minority>, I would have left youse there!"