Corang Circuit and Yurnga Lookout

Here are two pictures from my recent Budawang wander, one is a picture of the main trail into the Budawangs from Wog Wog, and the other is a picture of the bush-bashing I did to get to Yurnga Lookout. See if you can tell the difference.

But that is the nature of the Budawangs. Much of the area is declared wilderness which seems to mean limited track maintenance, and given the robust and spiky nature of the bush, any walk into the Budawangs will involve more than a little loss of skin.

I did the fairly standard Corang Circuit with a side trip up to camp overnight in the Burrumbeet valley and visit Yurnga Lookout. On my new topographic map, the main track (only track) from Wog Wog up to the head of Corang River is somewhat pompously called "Scenic Rim Walking Track," which seems to imply it is well graded and clear, full of happy bushwalkers strolling along. In actuality, it is narrow, overgrown, and difficult to follow in spots.

There are some pretty pools along the Corang River and near its junction with Canowie Brook there is an almost gorge like section with rock slabs, deep pools, and little cascades. Last time I did this walk we followed the main foot pad which climbs up above the River and skirts over some rock ribs, the prettiest part of the river is far below and mostly out of sight.

This time, I wanted to see if I could (a) avoid losing the track at Broula Brook (as we did last time) and (b) follow a low level route along the Corang River to Canowie Brook so I could see the pools. (A) was a definite success, in fact, the track dips into Broula Brook and straight out the other side. It is somewhat obscured, but, at least walking in a clockwise direction, easy to find. I notice that my last trip report (see it here), when we walked counter-clockwise, an arrow on a tree at Broula Brook pointed us in the wrong direction. So, beware any arrows on trees near Broula Brook.

As for (b), that was a conditional success. There is a scrappy in and out foot pad along the bank of the river that takes you past a pretty pool with two small cascades, but to stay at river level the whole way to the Canowie junction would require wading/swimming or significant loss of skin in dense scrub. I went up and down a number of times as the rock ribs that form cascades in the river also extend up slope and must be scrambled over.

Eventually, after the third or fourth climb/descent along the river bank, I decided I had lost enough flesh and followed a faint pad up to intersect the main foot pad not far from Canowie Brook and I walked along the track until I joined the main track. It was really near or past lunch time, but there was nowhere to sit in the shade but not buried in scrub so I decided to walk on to camp for lunch.

At Burrumbeet, I found a nice camp site near the creek, could have been the exact one we used on our minor Budawang epic seven years ago. The creek was close by and there are some impressive rock cliffs on either side of the valley. I had some tea, lunch, read my book, and before I knew it had been lazing about for an hour. But this was a training mission so I had to get moving again.

Mount Tarn was too far and just walking up the valley aimlessly was not appealing, so I decided to walk up to Yurnga Lookout. About a kilometre up valley, a low angle draw leads up to a short cliff line with views across to the Monolith area and Pigeon House Mountain. There was actually a scrap of a footpad heading up through coral fern, but, when the going got tough, in low twisted banksia and other thick scrub the footpad disappeared. Somehow I managed to stumble out onto a conglomerate slab on the west side of the draw, a mere 50 metres, that might as well have been 50 kilometres, from the named lookout.

Never mind, it was easy walking up the conglomerate slab and I got a good view over Yurnga Lookout and out across the intervening valley to the convoluted cliff lines of the Monolith area. I opted for a faster more direct "fall down the slope exit" on the way back to the main track which entailed avoiding detours around the thickest scrub and simply pushing through warrior style. Amazingly, I stumbled onto the footpad through fern coral, but, the intersection with the main track was hard to discern and I had to hunt around a bit to find the track heading back to camp.

Lovely evening light on the cliffs above camp and it was nice to think that I was likely the only person camped in the entire valley.

It was a pretty warm night but as I was camped alone, I enjoyed the luxury of drinking my morning mug of tea in my sleeping bag - what a sook! I planned to walk out along the trail but first I needed to find Corang Arch having walked on and off the plateau half a dozen times and never having seen the arch. After walking up the conglomerate slab, I headed along the western cliff-line until the arch was obvious. It is a neat feature, just difficult to capture on camera with bright morning light.

I was training, so of course I went over Corang Peak which does have 360 degree views if you climb up on the cairn. One last stop to the west of Korra Hill, one day I must try again to follow the old track down to the Yadboro River, and then out to the parking lot. The end of another Budawang wander.