Exploring the western fall of Cathedral Rock National Park, NSW

It has been too long between camping trips and the pleasure of waking this morning, amongst tall messmate and mountain gums, creates a resonate hum of joy, deep, deep inside.

The absolute stillness of the morning, coupled with the anticipation of the days ahead, feels like that exhilarating moment when the orchestra has finished its warm-up, the conductor raises his hand and we wait for the symphony to begin.

We are at Barokee Campground in Cathedral Rock National Park, located approximately 70 kilometres east of Armidale. Our backpacks sit by the car, ready for an off-track adventure. This national park is an important wild corridor linking larger parks to the north and south. It is small in comparison; a handkerchief of undisturbed land on the eastern edge of the New England High Country. Yet, it is crowded with mysterious and impressive wonders – it draws people in – us included.

Our walk is not the usual route that attracts visitors here. Most come for the scramble to the summit of Cathedral Rocks – a powerfully visual collection of granite boulders rising to a height of about 200 metres and extending for nearly one kilometre. But, from the summit of Cathedral Rocks, the view immediately west, across the closest gully, is of Round Mountain and the Snowy Range. It is there we plan on heading. 

Round Mountain reaches 1,584m above sea level and is the highest point on the New England Tablelands. Many of the plants are alpine and sub-alpine species more commonly found in the Snowy Mountains and Tasmania. Our aim is to walk up Round Mountain road then veer off-track on a compass bearing, weaving our way 1.5km through the scrub in search of a collection of rocky slopes and towering granite slabs. For many years, driving east from Armidale towards Dorrigo these bare slopes have caught our eye amongst the heights of the park's forested peaks. The rocks are not obviously marked on a topographic map but from the road they look enticing.

The range also has one other remarkable feature. As we walk along its spine, the gullies that slope away to our left feed the Macleay River catchment, which emerges at Kempsey. The creeks and gullies sloping to our right, feed the mighty Clarence River, which opens to the ocean at Yamba. We are walking one of the most significant watersheds in New South Wales. This watershed was used by early European settlers; mining for gold and sapphires along Snowy Creek. Apparently there is an aqueduct at Round Mountain, although the mountain height is now used for more modern technology - an air navigation guidance facility for northern NSW. 

From Barokee Campground it is an easy walk following Round Mountain Road to a locked gate, which although marked as ‘no vehicle access’ is open access for walkers. We climb on over the fence and head up the bitumen road, with the feeling that one of the mountain’s annual snow falls is not far away. The southern side of the mountain is shady, moist and facing the incoming weather. A tall forest of Manna Gums is scattered with tree ferns and crimson rosellas. 

On a hairpin bend we find the unmarked, but obvious, Snowy Range Trail. The trail cuts through open snow grass and vine thickets where satin bowerbirds squabble. It is not long and we are veering off-track on a compass bearing, following it diligently through thick forest. Although this park is dotted with bare granite peaks its vegetation is remarkably diverse – peppermint gums, mountain gum, snow gums. The under-storey can be quite densely crowded - pea flowers and mountain holly thrive here. Conesticks, geebungs and crinkle bush grow alongside tantoon tea tree, lemon bottlebrush, and prickly Moses. We feel these tough heath plants against our skin. 

Beneath the treetops lie clusters of granite rock, hidden like lost and ruined cities with towering domes and blocks, stone alleyways covered in moss and lichen, shrubs and saplings sprouting from fissures and gutters. As we weave through these we notice the clouds getting lower. We are not quite out to the edge of the range when we decide to make camp, finding a nice sheltered patch on a high point with views to the east and the west. We have just a precious hour to admire the view. The low, grey clouds soon become a winter whiteout. Visibility drops to just 50m in any direction. At 4:30pm, steady rain begins to fall.

One of the restrictions of walking along the spine of the range is access to water - it lies well below us in the swamps and gullies. We carry enough to get us out and back for one night only but we have enough food for two. We hope to find a secret, high mountain water source, or pools of rainwater in the weathered hollows of the granite tors. But as the rain steadily falls our solution is even easier than that. I place our cups on a couple of good drip points off the tent fly. Within an hour, we have another two litres. 

The next day, we use pools of water caught in the granite rocks to supplement our tent water and we have another day to walk and explore this mighty watershed. And, when we finally reach the rocks we have been searching for we are not disappointed.

The views south reveal the sharply defined edge of the New England Gorge country around Wollomombi and Long Point. The western fall of our range is a playground of granite. We find magical pockets of fairytale rainforest dripping with lichen and moss.  Many of the trees amongst the granite impress me with their tenacity and age - their trunks grown in an embrace with the boulders.  

It doesn't snow, but again early winter darkness falls and we run out of time on day two to explore the full extent of the granite outcroppings. There will be more time for that on the morrow. I tuck into my down sleeping bag for another night in this remarkable park, as the sound of rain on the tent returns like another, familiar and joyous kind of symphony beginning. 

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