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Kosciuszko Revisited

In the Summer of 2011, my son John and I took the Monaro Highway south from Canberra, heading for Charlotte’s Pass in Kosciuszko National Park. Full of enthusiasm, our plan on the day was to do the 18-kilometre round trip in seven or eight hours. We arrived at Charlotte’s around 9am, and were greatly disappointed to find thick fog, cold wind and icy rain lashing the windows of the car and making it rock. Nearby an organised group of hikers were getting ready to depart. They were fully kitted out with hiking poles and hooded wet weather gear over the top of bulky layers of warm clothing plus rucksack. I couldn’t imagine camping overnight in these conditions. With a seven- or eight-hour hike ahead of us and only summer clothes to keep us warm, we made the only rational decision possible and abandoned the hike. In any case, visibility was down to about 30 metres. Even if we had made it to the summit before hypothermia claimed us, there would have been nothing to see but thick fog. It’s possible the sun would have burned through as the day wore on. Even so, the hike was definitely “no-go”. But we hadn’t come all this way without doing some walking. So, we braved the elements and walked a hundred metres to a nearby look-out. After ten minutes out in that weather, the warm car seemed very inviting. We promised ourselves to return another day and complete the mission. Ten years later in February 2021, we again made our way to Charlotte’s Pass after driving down from Canberra. This time the weather gods smiled upon us benignly. The day was cool and mild, little wind and a deep blue sky that went all the way to infinity with barely a cloud in sight. We had rolled the dice and it came up a winner that day. A week earlier a cold front from Antarctica had blown a gale with freezing cold rain. Wind chill factor near freezing. A hundred and one times I had thought, “we must revisit Kosciuszko and do the climb!” It was unfinished business that kept nagging me. There is something symbolic about climbing mountains. It’s seems to

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