Tully Gorge Explore - Trip Report

Date: 26 October 2024
Leader: Luen
Participants: 4

We camped at the Tully National Park campground the night before, which made for an easy start to what was meant to be a big day in Tully Gorge. After an early wake-up, we drove to the start and dropped into the river, beginning the long push upstream through the boulder-choked gorge.

It did not take long to realise this was no ordinary rock hop. The boulders in Tully Gorge are enormous - more like houses than rocks - and moving through them was less a matter of walking and more a constant mix of climbing, scrambling, squeezing, and route-finding. The gorge here is a wild maze of caverns, pools, and giant stone corridors, and even on a straightforward upstream push, progress is slow and committing.

Before long, it became clear that the full loop would be ambitious for our pace in the available daylight. Ian, moving a little more slowly, made the sensible call to turn around early. The rest of us continued on for a while, but the pace remained slow. With some of us having wet feet, plenty of tricky climbs, and some sketchier boulder moves ahead, we spent plenty of time searching for the easiest and safest lines through. For confident scramblers, the terrain was a brilliant playground, but for a mixed group, it was obvious that this was going to be a much slower day than hoped.

Eventually, we accepted that the loop was not on the cards and shifted gears from "mission mode" to simply enjoying the place for what it was. That turned out to be the right call. We stopped for lunch, explored caves, ducked through tight squeezes between the boulders, and found underground waterfalls hidden inside the maze. There was plenty of swimming, plenty of laughter, and plenty of appreciation for just how unique this gorge is. One of the standout moments was a narrow squeeze through an underground boulder passage with a small waterfall splashing down onto your head as you wriggled through - the sort of feature that makes this place feel more like an adventure playground than a hike. The area is well known for exactly this sort of rugged, cave-like boulder travel, with deep pools, caverns, and hidden scrambles tucked throughout the gorge.

After making the most of the gorge, we turned around and carefully worked our way back through the boulders to the car, where Ian was waiting for us. While we did not complete the intended circuit, it was still a fantastic day out. Tully Gorge reminded us that in terrain like this, distance means very little and progress is earned one move at a time. Sometimes the best part of an exploratory trip is not ticking off the full route, but discovering just how much fun there is in the middle of the maze.

It's worth noting that the Club used to do this circuit regularly a decade or two ago - see our Club archives.

- Luen