Getting Off Easy: Mount Pillinger

Mount Pillinger on the eastern edge of Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park has tremendous views! There are two main approaches to the summit track, one from the north via the Arm River Track and one via a narrower valley to the south. Both approaches converge near a small tarn and the foot pad climbs Mount Pillinger from the east. The Arm River route involves 200 to 300 metres more elevation gain but the trail might be better. I can’t really say as it is 10 years since I was on the Arm River track. It was in very good shape then.

We took the Maggs Road approach and immediately after leaving an old cut block, the track enters dense scratchy scrub and skinny trees. Many Tasmanian approaches are through old growth forest and can be pleasantly soft underfoot and not all that scrubby. There is some of that further on, but initially the track is scratchy and scrubby climbing beside a creek for a hundred metres or so and then becoming much better walking through more open forest and even open grassy terrain. The Arm River branch joins in as the track crosses open grasslands and then, further west, another fork is reached with the left hand branch (south) beginning a steady climb to Mount Pillinger. There are some rocky sections, but the track is easy to follow with diversionary branches blocked off by old timber, and, after about 150 metres of elevation gain, the track passes through a scrubby saddle and then begins to climb more steeply to the top of Mount Pillinger at 1269 metres.  

The west face is sheer and the view is excellent with all the familiar peaks – Barn Bluff, Cradle, Ossa, the Pelions, Oakleigh, etc. laid out to the west. You can also see some of the Ducane Range peaks, although I am less adept at picking those out without a map! It was quite a pleasure to make the top in under three hours after our, in excess, of eight hour day the previous day.

Blue Derby

Blue Derby is arguably the benchmark to which every other riding destination in Australia is measured. With 125km of singletrack designed and constructed by World Trail, the mountain bike network saved the town, and has since attracted the EWS three times, since opening in 2016.

With massive rock features, fauna that looks straight out of the Jurassic Period, and some of the most magical dirt on earth, Blue Derby has trails to suit riders from seasoned gravity pros to families and beginners — and even a few one-of-a-kind oddities like the Derby Tunnel.

Derby on the whole, doesn’t require shuttles, but uplifts open up easy access to some of the network’s best trails.

From Flow Mountain bike site.

Blue Derby is a scene. There are cafe’s, pubs, distilleries, body-work providers (massage, dry needling, etc.), rental cottages and Air BnB’s as well as two camp-grounds which offer basic facilities and $5 showers (the showers were awesome). We arrived on a Saturday around lunch time and found a site beside the Ringarooma River for our van, and, after lunch, cycled along the green (easiest) trail – Riverside – which runs west to east and connects the western most side of town to the main trail hub.

What you soon learn about Blue Derby is that there is only one way to ride to the top of the main trail network. This isn’t strictly true, as there are some blue loop tracks, for example Wotchya Upta, which ascend and then descend, but the main track network is reached by riding up, in sequence: Axehead, Long Shadows, Long Shadows Upper. If you ride all these trails you’ll eventually arrive at the Black Stump where the shuttles arrive every few minutes and many of the downhill trails emanate from. The overall elevation change isn’t that large, under 300 metres, so it should be a pretty easy ride up, but, it’s not. Bear in mind that I am almost 63, on an analog bike (never give in) and not a great rider, but even Doug, who is about a thousand times better and fitter rider than me, found the uptracks difficult. Despite being an old lady, I can generally easily ride 300 metres uphill.

The first time I rode Axehead I thought “that was fun and unique.” Giant tree ferns arch over the track forming tunnels of greenery and the track passes Tasty Trout Falls on the Cascade River. The sixth time I rode, I was way less enamoured of this track that climbs a mere 50 metres and has at least two dozen switchbacks many of them very tight, steep and loose. At least three of those switchbacks I missed every single time I rode up!

Long Shadows gains another 100 metres and I could almost ride the entire trail. There’s a steep hill to start and then some more rocky switchbacks, one or two of which I missed every time (again). Finally, Long Shadows Upper. I only saw three other riders on this track ever and they were all on E-bikes. But, then again, hardly anyone rides uphill at Blue Derby. Despite the “doesn’t require shuttles” the majority of riders shuttle, even the E-bike riders. In fact, we met a family that rode Blue Derby all the time and they had never ridden a single uptrack! Long Shadows Upper gains a hard 100 metres. It’s very rocky and has at least a dozen tight switchbacks. Ironically, if you jump off Long Shadows and ride up the shuttle road instead (Cascade Dam Road) the ride is a cruise and does not even require the lowest gear. It was only on my last time up – I beat Doug up by a good margin because he came up Long Shadows Upper – that I realised hardly anyone rides Long Shadows upper or lower or any of the uptracks! Even the guided groups were riding up the access road if they weren’t shuttling! On our final day at Blue Derby, Doug performed an experiment, riding up the Axehead, Long Shadows, Long Shadows Upper route versus the Cascade Dam Road. The uptracks took three times as long and were much more fatiguing!

Unfortunately, on our first full day at Derby while riding Long Shadows Upper, Doug busted his derailleur. I continued on my own, while Doug managed to coast down Hazy Days – the bike was functional as long as no peddling was required – and spent the afternoon visiting bike shops! I continued and came down the same way inadvertently dropping onto the black track, Airyagarn, near the end and thinking “wow, this is steep for a green route!”

If Doug likes a track he will do it again while I always want to do something new so afternoons we would split up and I would ride off doing blue loops that were new to me. Some of these, like Rattler, were rocky and technical, while others, like Wochya Upta, were grippy dirt but had a lot – as in 25 to 30 – switchbacks!

We did one shuttle: the big one, the Bay of Fires trail which runs east from the Blue Tiers out to the Tasman Sea at Swimcart Beach. The statistics vary but my Garmin recorded just shy of 43 kilometres, 688 metres of elevation gain and 1450 metres of descent. I found the initial few kilometres a bit off-putting as there is a constant stream of shuttle buses bringing riders up to start the trail and everyone is jostling to go fast and get ahead. It is, apparently, quite popular to do the first 13 kilometres (mostly downhill) only and get picked up by another shuttle where the trail crosses a fire road. 

Part of the trail is on a fire road and that is where my derailleur blew up. Somehow, I managed to get my chain looped back on itself and the only way we could release the chain was to remove the derailleur. Doug, who is awfully clever at this stuff, managed to get the bike operational again with only two tools, but he was only able to restore a few of the lower gears so on the flatter sections my legs were whirling about and the derailleur rubbed on the chain the entire way! Luckily, by the time this happened, the crowds had thinned out. It’s a brilliant track and rideable even by old granny ladies on analogue bicycles. There is terrific scenery, beautiful forest, swooping descents, interesting climbs past big boulders and along ridge lines. Doug and I considered it well worth abandoning our purist principles and catching a ride to the top!

The Problem of the Longhouse

Before you read any further you need to watch this video of comedian Tyler Fischer parodying every NPR show ever. If you find the skit offensive, don’t read any further. If you find the skit hysterically funny and frighteningly accurate, you may read on. NPR, of course, is the American equivalent of our very own ABC, and what Fischer satirises in his two minute skit transfers exactly to our ABC. The relevance of this, is, of course, that the host of the Rescued Podcast is ex-ABC Caro R who spends virtually the entire hour of the podcast talking about Olga’s feelings. At no point does Caro talk about anything useful like having a paper map and compass, knowing how to use both of these essential implements (despite the fact that Caro teaches navigation), or being honest about your abilities. Instead, Caro, in typical ABC/NPR fashion emotionally vomits about “super powerful” moments and talks about “well thought out decisions.”

This most recent episode details the events behind a 38 year old solo female walker who became lost on a circuit walk in the Blue Mountains. The introduction to this episode reads:

“She's sharing her story today with real courage and gratitude, having received a bit of unhelpful judgement after the event. So in the spirit of the Rescued Podcast, I ask that we receive her story with kindness and see what we can all learn from her experience.”

The problem with this attitude is that if we are prohibited from forming any opinions we are unable to learn. In fact, you can listen to the entire episode of the podcast (almost one hour) and NOT learn a single thing because, apparently, judgements are emotionally unsafe. The reality, of course, is that Olga went out for a bushwalk with no map (she had AllTrails on her phone but did not know how to get the map with GPS location to work with no mobile phone signal), no compass, and, frankly, no clue. She had very little back up gear (no first aid kit, very little food, no paper map, very little extra clothing) and was, in the famous words of Accidents in North American Mountaineering, suffering from “inexperience, poor judgement, and exceeding abilities.”

Very soon after descending through the cliffs on the Devils Hole track (a route used by hundreds of hikers and climbers), Olga is lost. Initially, she attempts to use AllTrails to locate her position but when this does not work, she switches to Google Maps! A preliminary attempt to retrace her steps to where she had last definitively been on the track results in her being lost in a different direction. Her mobile phone died early on in her experience, but, luckily for Olga, not before she managed to get one text message out to her boyfriend who called SES and reported her lost. Eventually, Olga climbs a ladder and settles into a cave to await rescue. Ironically, during the entire 24 hour episode, Olga is less than a kilometre from the suburban streets of Katoomba.

Both Olga and Caro are opposed to “judgements” which they say are unhelpful. What is unhelpful is pretending that there is anything edifying coming out of this podcast despite Caro’s gushing about “gold nuggets” and “really good stuff.” In fact, if you listened to this podcast without judgement you would come away thinking that there is no amount of preparation, equipment, knowledge or even basic common sense that would change the outcome.

But, of course that is not true. After even a cursory glance at a map, an experienced and competent navigator would know that to “get found” all Olga had to do was walk downhill. Had she done this, she would have intercepted the Six Foot Track – an unmistakable fire trail at this location – which she could then follow back to Katoomba.  Of course, there is also a climbers track that runs from the base of Devils Hole all the way to the old waterboard (Dicksons) ladders 400 metres south of Devils Hole.  This could be followed back north to regain Devils Hole track and back up to Katoomba.  

This the epitome of the Longhouse in action. An obsessive focus on feelings and safetyism, to the detriment of all else. The Longhouse leaves us stuck in a place where we cannot learn anything, cannot course correct, cannot change because our feelings are too tender to be assaulted by any kind of comment, no matter how carefully worded or obvious in actuality. The sad reality of the problem of the Longhouse comes at the end of the podcast where Olga reports that she never walks in the Blue Mountains alone any more. Left unsaid is the obvious assumption that Olga is too anxious/nervous to walk by herself because she lacks basic navigational skills. So an opportunity to learn a new skill and expand horizons is put aside in favour of the elusive comfort of avoiding any disquieting emotions.

Into the Walls of Jerusalem or Choosing the Wrong Option: Solomons Throne and The Temple

It is a decade since Doug and I walked into the Walls of Jerusalem with Jason who had not long completed his successful circumnavigation of Australia by sea kayak. The Walls were a quieter place then. Now there is a constant stream of bushwalkers heading in or heading out, the flow is almost uninterrupted! We started at 7:30 am walking up – the best bit of the track – the initial uphill section to the undulating plateau at about 1150 metres. Dozens of walkers passed us on the way out. When you are on the way out at 7:30 in the morning, I always wonder why you didn’t just finish the walk out the night before. At this time of year, it is dark until almost 7:00 am so, unless these folk started walking at 4:00 am (perhaps they did), they must have been within striking distance of the trail head. But, if the increasing creep of left wing authoritarianism in Australia has taught me anything it is that it’s not my business!

We passed the old trappers hut (1050 metres) and the track that goes to Lake Adelaide. A new (at least to us) sign at the trailhead advertises the route through Dixons Kingdom, down to Ball Lake and back via Lake Adelaide as a two or three day circuit. I imagine the circuit is quite popular. I also imagine, after reacquainting myself with the trail, that many hikers find it tougher than the track statistics would imply. I certainly did!

Past the Lake Adelaide junction, the track goes up a bit, down a bit, up a bit, down a bit, to the left, to the right, to the right and left, followed by to the left than right. In other words, it is surprisingly slow given there is no real elevation gain until the ascents to Herods Gate and then Damascus Gate. I kept looking at my Garmin watch and thinking “how is it possible that we are so slow?” Eventually, we passed the new (at least to us) campsite at XXX creek, just below Herods Gate. It was gratifying to finally come out into some more open terrain as we passed by Lake Salome. We had a brief stop here, sitting on a boulder in the sun looking down on Lake Salome and across to The Temple with King Davids Peak behind. As an aside, how is it possible that the woke crowd has not demanded that all these places be renamed? The Christian themed names of these places must be driving them bat-shit crazy!

Of course I had hopes of tagging the three highpoints around Damascus Gate: King Davids Peak (the highest and most impressive although the ascent is, as usual, up the gentle back/west side), Solomons Throne (which I had done before) and The Temple. Doug, who is eminently more sensible than me was planning on hiking up one of these only and chose Solomons Throne (called Halls Buttress on the topographic maps). I decided I would walk up Solomons Throne with Doug and continue along to King Davids Peak. All Trails shows a footpad along the ridge between the two.

Walking up Halls Buttress/Solomons Throne was like a mini-Everest expedition – there was an actual traffic jam! A group of seniors was slowly crawling up, with one fellow making so much noise I thought a cardiovascular event must be imminent. We managed to pass this group near the ridge top and soon were at the top of Halls Buttress and a magnificent view point. I walked up here at dawn on a frosty morning ten years ago and remember being impressed with the quality of the track. The track is stellar. Big boulders have been moved to make good steps all the way. 

A young couple of backpackers who were ahead of us continued on to King Davids Peak their speed a bit of a wake up call to me that the walk between Solomons Throne and King Davids Peak would not be any quicker (and likely a good bit slower) than the track into Damascus Gate. The ridge between the two drops 60 metres and then gains 90 metres, and is about three kilometres return (not counting all the twists and turns). A son and his father who were just ahead of us were enjoying the view and later we would meet them after they traversed the ridge to King Davids Peak and descended the northern aspect to regain the track near Lake Salome. The seniors group stumbled past us, moving exceptionally slowly and shakily. One woman had an unusual (honestly stupid) pack design where most of the weight and bulk was carried on two enormous pockets on her chest. This might seem like a good idea to someone who has never scrambled before because, initially, it might seem that you are equalising the weight between the anterior and posterior aspects of the body. It’s not, however, a good idea, and impairs the ability to use your arms for balance and for minor climbing moves.

But all this is beside the point as I realised I had chosen the wrong door. The walk to King Davids Peak would take more time, energy and leg endurance than I had available to me – I am an old, out of shape, walker too! I should have chosen The Temple because I had never been up it before. I left Doug on top of Solomons Dome and hoofed it down the track to Damascus Gate and up the also amazing track on the opposite side of Damascus Gate that climbs to the top of The Temple. The Temple is only 50 metres lower than King Davids Peak and has a tremendous view of its own, including across Jaffa Gate to Mount Jerusalem. There is a good track up Mount Jerusalem as well (we did that with Jason back in 2016). Even better, there was no-one at all on The Temple. I could see Doug across Damascus Gate on Solomons Dome and texted him to say that if he let me know when he was leaving Solomons Dome, as I would also descend The Temple and we could walk out together.

Doug regained the main track perhaps a minute or two before me and we started the long walk out together. We were now passing hordes of walkers coming in, rather than out. What a busy place! I got back to the van at about 4:00 pm so an 8.5 hour day (including stops) to cover a meagre 14 kilometres, although there was a decent amount of elevation gain included. I had to resort to more Vitamin I that night (Ibuprofen) as my injured hip was aching. We were camped in our van beside Lake Rowallan and had a wonderful fresh water swim when we got back to camp. I like to think the “cold therapy” (although it wasn’t actually that cold) did something to help recovery!

Ironstone Mountain

A number of tracks pierce the Western Tiers from the valleys to the north, most (all?) fork off the Westrope Road which runs west to east along the base of the tiers at around 700 metres ASL (above sea level). It is two years since we were last along the Westrope Road to walk a loop up Mother Cummings Peak and, in that time, the road has deteriorated some. The road bed is still good but the road itself is increasingly narrow as the forest grows in from either side. Nevertheless, we parked at the intersection of the Westrope Road and a small spur road that leads up to the start of the Western Creek trail. There is a loop walk along this trail – an endeavour that would take you about 1.5 hours and would be a singularly unrewarding walk for the effort involved. We did not realise this and set off immediately from the end of the spur road on the lower half of the loop track.

There were a few fallen trees to navigate and, in places, the track was vague. Throughout it was rocky, rooty, and slippery, the dark rainforest humid and wet year round. An hour or so after leaving the vehicle we intercepted the “top” half of the loop walk and some signage. For a short while, the track improved and was well banked into the hillside, but this lasted only 10 or 15 minutes before the character reverted to rocks, roots, talus, ups and downs, all while sidling along the hillside above roaring Western Creek. After a further half an hour, a side creek with a small waterfall is crossed on a sturdy bridge. Without the bridge this would be a difficult crossing as the creek is a foaming precipitous torrent.

In another 15 minutes, the main creek is crossed on rocks and the track finally emerges from the dark forest onto the scrubby plateau. Ahead on a hillside, the new outhouse that is nearby to the old Whiting Hut is visible, and, although it looks a long way, the going is much easier and the old hut is soon reached. We were about two hours to the hut which is awfully slow for the distance covered and a sad reminder that I am now an old lady. It’s not a fast track to walk, in fact, in places, the track is more a scramble than a walk, but, ten years ago, I would cover that terrain much faster.

Beyond the hut the track quickly becomes indistinct but is still easily followed for perhaps a kilometre until low scrub gives a view to a series of narrow talus slopes that ascend towards a pass to the northeast of some steeper crags that run west down from the Ironstone plateau. Looking at the Ironstone plateau, there is a prominent craggy buttress to the far right (climbers or “lookers” right) and then two smaller little crags to the left. The aim is to ascend 200 metres to the plateau via this pass. If you walk up the talus fields about half way up, cairns appear and a rough footpad ascends to the pass. Lose this footpad at your peril as to either side, the scrub is thick.

Ironstone Mountain is really a large flat plateau and once at the pass the major difficulty is working out where the summit trig is. A compass helps, but the best route we found did not head straight to the trig station, rather it followed areas of lower scrub and talus to finally arrive at the sturdy and familiar black circle trig. There is a good view from the top with all the familiar peaks of Cradle Mountain/Lake St Clair National Park easily seen, and of course, the lakes; the hundreds of lakes, tarns, ponds, streams and rivulets of the Central Plateau.

It had taken us four hours to reach the top so we did not have time to linger for much longer than 15 minutes before retracing our route. We were slightly faster back to the hut, although we did have to reverse our path part way down from the pass as we had veered off the footpad. In general, the footpad will be to your left (skiers left) as you descend but it is easy to trend right and lose the footpad on false leads. Back at the hut, we had another quick break and removed all the detritus that had collected in our shoes, and then began the slow walk out.

Only on the way down the track did I realise just how rough a track it actually is. This is frequently the case. Tracks that seem like a pleasant gradient on the way up, suddenly seem quite steep once you begin the eccentric loading against gravity that walking downhill entails. However, it’s not the steepness of the track that makes it difficult. It is the rocky, rooty, technical terrain all of which is covered with a slick of moisture and is slippery underfoot. At the upper track junction, we took the upper trail back which was a lot better than the lower trail having a reasonable benched in trail for part of the distance. We may have shaved a further 10 or 20 minutes off our ascent time but, overall, this trip will take as long on the way up as it does on the way out.

That Person

I feel as if I’ve become that person; the one who orders the ridiculously specialised coffee at the cafe. The half-shot, triple decaf, no froth, snow leopard milk, extra tepid in a mug made in Machu Picchu during the Inca period and rinsed out with unicorn tears. And it is a trendy cafe we are in: Doug and I completely out of place in this hip back alley cafe trying to get a plain old burger for Doug and something without meat – I can’t believe I am asking for something with NO meat! - for me. When I ask the very helpful and friendly (trendy and handsome too!) barista if they can whiten a coffee with something other than dairy milk, he looks upon us kindly, aliens that have arrived in the new trendy Devonport, our grey hair and wrinkled visages giving us away as old people or worse boomers.

In the 1980’s I lived in Devonport, in an old house only two blocks from the ocean. I kept swimming right up until mid April, although the water was pretty cold by that time. Devonport seemed a lot smaller and a lot less fancy in those days. There were no trendy cafes, or Kathmandu retail stores, just milk bars serving burgers and pubs that were a little rough around the edges. Even then, however, there was a back to the earth, trendy contingent in the area. I was training as a midwife at the Mersey Maternity Hospital and occasionally a couple would ask us to wrap up the placenta for them to take home. Some had rissoles recipes (true story), while others had secret mystic rituals planned. I volunteered once a week at the Wilderness Society Office and my beat up old car sported dozens of ‘greenie’ stickers. For some reason, the Wilderness Society Office always smelt of joss sticks and so did I when it came time to leave.

Two days before I had used my epi-pen and called an ambulance to the mountain bike parking lot. Some mild dizziness which had troubled me in the night, had gradually worsened after eating a piece of bacon for breakfast. In my usual, “I’ll just ignore it” fashion, I had started riding my mountain bike up the trails. But the dizziness progressed until even I admitted there was something wrong. I took the much shorter, downhill road route back to the van and realised that without intervention I was rapidly heading for unconsciousness, just like when I get a tick bite. By the time the ambulance arrived, the epinephrine had taken effect and my symptoms had receded.

As long as I’ve had my anaphylactic allergies (which is over 25 years), I’ve considered myself lucky because I don’t have food allergies. True anaphylactic food allergies are difficult to manage. Every label has to be examined closely and eating anything you have not prepared yourself carries some unknown, but possibly life threatening risk. You can be prepared but you can never prevent every eventuality. I carry a very comprehensive anaphylaxis kit which is prominently labelled EPI PEN and includes instructions on what to do should I be found unconsciousness.

We always think we would know what we would do in any circumstance. I’ve had friends die from cancer, more and more as I get older and cancer becomes more prevalent. Almost all of them fought the good fight, the valiant battle to the end. The last year(s) of their lives were consumed with medical and surgical treatments that, in the end, simply delayed the inevitable. Very few, two that I can name, refused treatment, and one chose MAD (medically assisted dying). I think about this a lot now. What would I do? I want to believe I would go gracefully and fearlessly into “that good night,” but when I feel the darkness closing in and I desperately reach for my epi-pen, I know, in my heart, that I am nowhere near ready to leave this world, which is crazy and imperfect, but nonetheless breathtakingly beautiful.

Are We All LARPing?

Mark Carney’s speech at the World Economic Forum (WEF) made a big splash yesterday. The elbows up crowd had their elbows so far up they practically began flying. I listened to the whole speech twice. Not because it was the best speech I had ever heard but because much of it was reminiscent of someone’s Linked In profile or the weird HR lady doing a presentation on cultural strengths at the wokest workplace. Jargon that sounds profound but when you slow the sound track down and actually listen, not simply hear, you wonder how lofty ideals, like “calibrating our relationships so their depth reflects our values” are instituted in real life.

Of course, if you do listen carefully, and also dig into the substance of Carney’s speech you realise that the lofty goals of decarbonising and net zero went out the window when economic crises loomed. Which, with the exception of everyone who has spent the last decade LARPing as a climate advocate while flying around the world, knew they would. The carbon tax, at least for households, was the first thing Carney removed. Next came boosts to mining, oil and gas production. In Carney’s own words: “We are fast-tracking $1 trillion of investments in energy, AI, critical minerals, new trade corridors and beyond.” Fast tracking, of course, is code for we have reduced environmental protections that cover resource extraction industries.

Canada is in a tough spot. The USA, which has always loomed over the country as an elephant towers over a mouse, is extremely reliant on trade with the USA. And, it’s not all one way, Canada imports 30% of its food and this is not all processed junk food which any country can actually thrive without, it includes fruits, vegetables and even meat. Almost 50% of Canada’s fresh produce is imported.

There is no doubt that Canada needs a new way forward, and Carney could be the man to orchestrate that. All this stuff is way outside my pay grade. I found being President of a recreational club challenging so I cannot imagine the pressures that the Prime Minister of Canada must feel as he seeks to realign an entire country's economy whilst trying to maintain the high standard of living that Canadian’s have come to expect.

Canada’s strength, Carney propounds is “a recognition of what’s happening and determination to act accordingly.” It is an “honesty about the world as it is” and “the capacity to stop pretending, to name realities.” This is the only way forward because no problem has ever been solved by obfuscation, and certainly Canada needs some truth and honesty about the issues it faces. The only problem is, are Canadian’s ready for truth and honesty?

The entire country is still in the grip of one of the greatest controversies of its entire history: the residential school affair, which has cost the country upwards of $40 billion despite the fact that no human remains have ever been found. And, of course, there was the illegal freezing of bank accounts during the trucker convoy in February 2022 when Canada’s government (under Trudeau) acted against its own citizens. In 2024, Canada’s publicly funded health program was forced to pay for a man to have a fake vagina created while keeping his own penis. The case was won because Ontario signed up to the WPATH guidelines (an interesting story by itself), and, Canada continues to house “trans” women (even those guilty of violent crimes) in women’s prisons. In fact, we can thank Canada for exporting to the world, entirely new categories of gender. Carney’s speech was both inspirational and aspirational but it remains to be seen whether the Canadian public is actually ready to grapple with reality or whether the entire enterprise is simply the placing of a different sign in the window.