Overland Track Trip Report

[Damien]

My girlfriend and I finished walking the Overland track a couple of weeks ago.
This is just a quick debrief of things we experienced and things we learned.

We had fine weather for the whole trip and were quite lucky in that regard.
It did get very cold at night however, dropping below zero a couple of times.

For most of our walk there were only 14 people, apparently there were a few more booked in that just didn't show up.
This worked out to be a good thing as there was more room in the huts and less people to learn the names of.
In our group we had 10 people from Adelaide, 2 from Canberra, 3 from Sydney, 2 from the UK and 1 from Ireland.
The huts are good and clean, the hut capacities stated in the book are definately 'maximum'.
All of the huts have tank water and composting toilets. We only saw 3 rangers for the whole trip at Waterfall Valley, Pelion and Windy Ridge.
Some of the huts like Windermere are very cosy, bring a tent if you want some privacy.
The wildlife is VERY tame and the possums have no issue with diving onto you / your tent / your pack to find food.
If you are camping leave ALL of your food in the huts, on our first night we were visited by possums every 2 hours.

Our walking itinerary was as follows:

Day 1 - Ronny Creek to Waterfally Valley
Day 2 - Waterfally Valley to Windermere
Day 3 - Windermere to Pelion
Day 4 - Pelion to Kia Ora (went up Mt Ossa, allow for 3-4 hours)
Day 5 - Kia Ora to Pine Valley (had lunch at Windy Ridge then pushed on)
Day 6 - Pine Valley to Narcissus (caught the 1pm Ferry back to Lake St Clair)

If you are factoring in a rest day, have it at Pelion. It is huge, warm and almost luxurious.
If you want to skip a day there were 4 people that joined our group by walking from Waterfally Valley to Pelion in 1 day.
They were pretty wrecked after such a long day walking and arrived at Pelion about an hour after sun down.

Equipment that I took and didn't use:
Steripen Classic - water quality was fine, didn't end up using more than twice.
Steripen Filter - once again, water quality was fine.
Maps / Map Case - I brought along all of the relevant 1:25000 maps and used them once. The track is very well marked. Just bring the guide book for info / maps.
First Aid Kit - full commercial kit, will probably strip it down for the next walk.
Books - I took 2 novels and a Lonely Planet Guide to Tasmania... I'm sticking to 1 book next time. I'll photocopy anything else that might be relevant.

Equipment I forgot to bring:
Fleece Pants - luxury item, my Macpac Mountain Versatile Pants were fine.
Belt - always bring a belt...
Hut boots - I brought Tevas (sandals) where hut boots would have suited the conditions better.

A couple of other things we learnt from this trip:

With coal fires, light the kindling first then once it's going add the coal, ignore the instructions in the huts.
Bring some tealight candles for use in the huts. They weigh nothing and save torch batteries.
A 230gm Gas Canister lasts 2 people 5 days. Take 2 canisters and 2 boxes of matches.
Bring some Aquium hand sanitiser to help prevent against gastro. This isn't on any of the recommended gear lists.
Plan your meals carefully. We brought a lot of excess food and a lot of fresh food (5 oranges, 5 apples, 5 mandarins and 3 avocados).
Although it was a nice luxury and we ate very well, my pack weighed around 28kg at the start of the walk and around 23kg by the end of the walk.
In future we will be planning meals much more carefully and using pre prepared dehydrated meals to help reduce weight.

Thats about it. We had a great time and met some people that will be life long friends.
If you have any specific questions about the trip just post them below. I might post up an equipment list at a later date.

[under10kg]

I did the waterfall to pelion hut in one day two months ago in sleeting rain. If you are fit, this is not a big day by normal bushwalking club standards. I did have time to walk to the next hut too but the fresh bread baked by one of the commercial groups given to us normal walkers made me stay at pelion! However, 28kg is a pretty heavy pack. I did the overland trip very conformably 2 months ago and my total gear weight was 10kg with specialized lightweight gear.

[Son of a Beach]

I used to do a first day from Dove Lake/Ronnie Creek/Waldheim to Windermere OR a second day from Waterfall Valley/Cirque Hut to Pelion as a standard day. Having a longer day near the beginning means that it's easier to fit in side trips or rest days later on, if desired.

These days if I do the Overland Track, or part of it, I don't stop at Waterfall Valley, Windermere or Pelion, but use much nicer (or at least more isolated) camping spots elsewhere.