Mt Vincent is in the Darling Range, about 70km or so to the south-east of Perth, and at around 500 metres above sea level, is one of this region’s highest “mountains”. It’s on a stretch of the Bibbulman Track, which runs over 1,000km from Kalamunda in the Perth Hills all the way to Albany on the southern coast. My day out took me on just a few kilometres.
It was quite some time since I’d been out on the track. The last hike I blogged was back in January 2010 (Winter hike to Kawanori-san), and although there have been a few small unblogged trips since then, it’s been a long time. And Kawanori-san was very different conditions to here in Western Australia – snow and steep slopes, neither of which are very common here! So, I was a bit excited to head out for a day last Easter 2013, as the hot summer weather was starting to fade off, to explore a new hiking location near Perth. I’ve been here for over a year, and I’ve discovered that bushwalking season here is during the cooler months.
I had some track notes for a reasonably short walk from Sullivan Rock up to Mt Vincent and return. The car park is located on the Albany Highway about 35km from the Perth suburb of Armadale, from where a side-track passes up and over a large exposed rock face called Sullivan Rock and then joins the main Bibbulman Track on the other side.
Sullivan Rock is covered in some fragile mossy patches, so walk around them, and follow the rock cairns to the other side.
There are even some rock pools on top of Sullivan Rock.
Gone are the mountain ash and messmate forests that I’m familiar with in south-eastern Australia, and instead I need to learn about wandoo and jarrah. And grass trees, which are striking throughout the forest.
As least I found that some of the fauna looks familiar.
500 metres above sea level doesn’t seem very high, but the weather was warm and it was hot going. As I climbed higher, the view across the broad valley got better and better. Grass trees and jarrah (or is that wandoo?) as far as we can see.
Including a stop for my picnic lunch on the top, the round trip took only a few hours. This was not a long trip, but an exploratory foray into my new local outdoors. There were still some views on the way down before I reached the forest canopy again.
The Bibbulman Track is marked by the yellow track markers in the photo below. The snake design is a Waugal of the local Nyoongar people, on whose land the tack passes. Imagine marking out the track – every 200 metres or so for around 1,000km.
Then the track arrives back at Sullivan Rock. From the top of the exposed rock is a view southwards towards the next mountain on the Bibbulman Track, Mt Cooke. It’s nearly 600 metres high!
This gallery contains more of the photos of the day.
