After completion of this task we wandered down to the edge of the lake to say farewell to our driver and take a last look at the starting end of the track. Our driver wished us a safe and successful trek before going back to his photography. With that we set out around the edge of the lake, following the path to the first major point on the track, Marion’s Lookout.
As we rounded the lake we were immediately plunged into a light tunnel of trees guiding our way around the lake. The path rose and fell but offered no real problems at this point. The path had been mostly protected from the snowfall by the covering of trees and any snow that had got through had been kicked away by day walkers. I felt that we were making excellent time when after what only seemed a few minutes the trees thickened and Dove Lake disappeared from view and we began a small climb.
As we reached the top of the climb the trees broke and we were afforded an excellent view of the lower end of Cradle Mountain. I was feeling good about everything and was confident of a successful day’s walking. Although one slight concern was already beginning to arise in the back of my mind, I felt that Hiro was dropping behind me far too quickly. I stopped to enjoy Cradle Mountain as I waited for Hiro, when he arrived I broached the subject with him.
“Hey Hiro, how you going?”
“Oh, very good,” he replied with a smile and a nod.
“I was just concerned that you were falling behind.”
“Don’t worry. I walk slow but for long way.”
I thought that this was fair enough but I knew that dropping my pace dramatically would make things very difficult for me. I decided that we needed some compromise and suggested that Hiro walked a bit faster and whenever I got too far ahead I would stop and wait. I set myself a rule that if he ever dropped out of view then I would stop immediately and wait for him to catch up. I set out again happy that we had reached an understanding on how we would walk over the duration of our trek.
Within a short while we had reached a small but pretty lake named as the Wombat Pool by the sign in front of us. The water was calm and clear and our view was beautifully framed by the branch of a tree that worked its way above our heads at the lookout point on the edge of the lake. I took the opportunity to take a couple of photographs of the lake and of a Currawong that had landed near us.
I looked up to our right and saw a fairly high ridge, which had people standing on a lookout point looking over the lake. I assumed that this was probably Marion’s Lookout and told Hiro this.
“Oh, very good,” replied Hiro.
We headed off round the outside of the Wombat Pool towards the path that led to the top of the ridge. The path rose and fell in fairly steady gradients before crossing a small but fast flowing creek. This suggested that the snow was probably melting and this could only be good news, although it would make the rest of the walk a bit on the wet side!
The climb towards this lookout was fairly steep and rough going. The snow was also beginning to get a bit deeper. We passed our first set of day walkers around this point. They said good morning and wished us luck on the track. I simply smiled and nodded thanks.
About halfway up I stopped to take a rest and to let Hiro catch up again. He’d only dropped back twenty metres but I decided that it was a good place to have a rest. I could see the brother and sister beginning to catch him up behind. When Hiro caught me up I asked him how he was doing.
“Oh, very good.”
I smiled as this seemed to be developing into Hiro’s standard response. We continued to climb the ridge, which was now getting quite steep. The snow was shin deep, which created additional difficulties. After a few more minutes of dragging ourselves to the top of the ridge we reached the lookout point which provided splendid views over the Wombat Pool and out to Dove Lake.
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