Wow, Wow, Wow what a difference a day makes. It was warm and dry overnight and we woke up to a magical day.
We dropped our vehicle off at our planned end point for the day and our host drove us 2.3km across the Valley to yesterday’s end point. Up and over one of the many styles on this trail but this time into a paddock beside the obligatory tree boundary but what a difference the grass was mown like a lawn 3m wide and only a small residual dew from early morning mist. Just a blissful and pleasant way to start our day. Then a short piece of road down the hill and into the Woodlands along the top of the escarpment. Again a wonderful piece of the trail but with just one day dry and warm the ground was no longer a mudslide, such a huge difference, we were actually able to relax and walk instead of hesitantly looking for a firm footing. The only real challenge was to stay on the trail as it was mostly covered with a good covering of autumn leaves, if it was not for the white blazes there was no way you would know where to go. The first half of the day took us along the Escarpment on the Northern side of the Beaver Valley. The trail meandered up and down the scarp taking us down to view the many streams emerging from the side of bluff. Basically water collects up on the high ground and finds it’s into the subterranean rivers in the Dolomitic Limestone of the escarpment only to drain out the side of the scarp at some point. They all vary in size with some being a mere trickle while others are a stream cascading down the scarp face.
The first high point being the Hogg’s Falls up at the head of the valley. Although only 7m high the volume of water flowing over makes them spectacular. The water is so pristine and clear that you can clearly see the polished rock below it’ s surface. The second high point comes a bit later after a bit of a slog on the Escarpment on the Southern side of the valley, when we reached the Eugenia falls, which is the spill point for Lake Eugenia. These falls are 30m high but with a lot less water flowing over them, rendering them a bit less spectacular than Hogg’s Falls.
As we had arrived at Eugenia Falls at midday we walked up the hill in search of a cold drink to go with our packed lunch. The “Emporium” was closed but a small general store was open and the bakery. We got our cold Powerade and a fresh warm half Baguette of Sourdough, found a cool spot to enjoy lunch.
With only 3.6km left to get back to our car we set off the cross over the top of the Falls. We were immediately presented with a hellaciously steep hill with a multitude of tracks crisscrossing it, we finally found the white blazes and struggled to climb the beast. Once up and over the rest of the trail was again a superb piece of trail with a few ups and downs. At some point along this piece of trail we encountered 1000’s of twittering and screeching birds but were unable to see them initially, just this loud cacophony off to our left lower down the scarp. Finally they moved up the hill and there were 100’s of black birds about the size of Starlings darting in and above the forest. We had no idea what they were doing or feeding on, just darting around wildly.
The final 500m was downhill and we encountered our first bit of slithery mud for the day. This trail just never lets you have it easy, that’s for sure.
We had left clean comfy shoes and a couple of bottles of water, which we had frozen last night, in the car. Now it was time to set of for Barrie 1 hr’s drive away to visit MEC a camping, hiking shop to find some replacements for gear we had broken along the way. Whilst there we ran into Ken & Margaret the local couple from Thornbury that we have been meeting along the trail and who we had dinner with on Tuesday night. Margaret was trying out some new boots as her current once are giving her grief as they were a bit tight. Now for the long drive back to our digs to clean up and find somewhere to eat.
It has been one of the best days so far on the Bruce trail and hopefully will continue this way. Now time to chill with a glass of wine to finish our day.