Lerderderderderderderderg

Lerderderg. Who the hell named that place? Anyway, it's a great place for hiking.

Hannah & I went out today with the backpacks, carrying about 8kgs and 11gks respectively. Part of the weight in the packs was our real gear, but I ended up stuffing woolen blankets and other things in there to bring the weight up higher still.

We started off down in the gorge, and walked for a solid hour straight up one of the hills. We walked for over 2.5 hours in total, which doesn't sounds like much, but when it's unrelenting uphill carrying a decent weight, you certainly notice your legs. :-) Here's the track we walked.

It's physically demanding at times, but we figure, the fitter & healthier we are when we start the Camino, the more we will enjoy it and learn from it. Plus, it's fresh air & beautiful scenery... how can we really complain?

One thing I would definitely recommend for people going out there: track down and purchase the official map to the park. The place is huge (14,250 hectares), and the signage within the park is shitful. You can get a basic map from here, but I'm not sure how much I'd trust it. The one place in the park that we really wanted a map for simply didn't have the detail to work out where the track started from. Oh, if you forget to print the map before you leave, they've got copies of it at the tourist info office in Bacchus Marsh (about 20 mins before you get to the park).

Something in the park amused me: somebody had graffitied "Wolf Creek" in the picnic area. If you've seen the movie (inspired by Ivan Milat's backpacker murders, and Peter Falconio's murder), I'm sure that's the last thing you'd want to be thinking about just before you head off into the wilderness. Glad we saw that after the hike. ;-)

We're very much in Get Stuff Done mode now. It's only just over 3 months until we leave, and we still have soooooooo much to do -- the main thing being obtaining work visas for an as yet undecided destination. EEEEEEEK! I've created project management documents, and Hannah has printed A3 sized calendars for the remaining few months. Our place is going to look like NASA headquarters until we've got everything sorted.