The view is just staggering for its grandeur and beauty. From my lofty position atop Box Ridge, I count six mountain ranges lined up to the south. You can see well into Victoria. What's more, slithering like a silver snake through the deepest gorge below is the fabled Snowy River, dripping with myth and legend of early stockmen.
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Almost as jaw dropping as the panorama from this deck, hand-crafted from local cypress pine, is the comment from Karen Davidson, one of my hosts: "You missed a much better view earlier," she deadpans.
At first I think she must be demonstrating a peculiar form of high country sarcasm. How could this view get any better? But it's soon clear she's not joking. "At dawn today, the sun shining off the layers of mist in the valleys was magical," she explains, producing a photo captured on her smartphone as evidence.
Davidson's partner Owen Davis weighs in on the debate. "I reckon the best time here is on a spring or summer afternoon when you watch storms develop; lightning starts fires and then another storm puts them out", he asserts while carrying a pot of billy tea and a basket of freshly made scones to our table.
Regardless of the time of day I can't think of anywhere else in Australia to rival this as a location for Devonshire Tea. Sure the Blue Mountains has some knock-out tea rooms overlooking the spectacular Megalong Valley escarpment, but this view is even bigger and even more dramatic and what's more, we have it to ourselves. Oh, apart from the lyrebird fossicking through the scrub just behind us, and Kerry Wellsmore, my hosts' straight-talking neighbour (as much as you can be a neighbour when your driveways are five times longer than Northbourne Avenue).
Eager to discover more about the wilderness spread out below, I pull a topographic map of the area out of my bag. With contours closer together than wrinkles on an old stockman's furrowed brow, the map is dotted with evocatively named landmarks including Pot Hole Creek, Wild Woman Ridge, The Devils Hole, and The Black Scrub. But it's soon clear with Wellsmore in tow, I won't need a map. As a sixth generation bushman from this part of the Snowy, he knows this country like the back of heavily-calloused hands.
Between gulps of tea, and with animated hand gestures in the direction of various hills and creeks, Wellsmore recounts a potted history of major events that have unfolded on the valleys below us. "Beyond that mountain with the bald peak was the Elliot Homestead, where in the mid-1800s little Margaret Elliot was delivered by John, her father." he explains. "She lived the first nine years of her life without leaving the valley". Heck, talk about isolation.
"Then there's the story of Tom Reid who left two of his boys, Norman and Harry, aged just 12 and 14, down in the bush near Reedy Creek all winter to trap wild dogs," Wellsmore discloses. "They carved their names into an old apple box with an axe." No iPads to keep them amused back then I guess. Oh, and if you are wondering what the kids ate, apparently they didn't starve. "He'd [John] bring them supplies once a fortnight," explains Wellsmore.
"Imagine what they'd have given for a morning tea like this?" I ask as Davidson places yet another serve of hot scones, dripping with jam and cream, in front of me.
I could listen to Wellsmore's bush yarns (and eat scones) all day, and it's only the promise of an adventure down to the Snowy, some 700 metres vertically below that eventually lures me away from my seat.
And wow, what an adventure it is. Bumping along in my hosts' tour vehicle, a Land Rover Discovery, we first arrive at a hotch-potch collection of eroded cores of ancient volcanos. Each is surrounded by lavas flow pock-marked with sink holes big enough to harbour a family of bunyips. Davis calls these curious formation tubbits, which I can't even find in the dictionary. However, it's that sort of place, despite white folk being around these parts for 150-plus years, there's still a feeling that this is frontier country.
Further on, Davis points down into a ravine perilously close to my side of the car. "Down there is Bill Jones' hut from the early 1940s, nobody knows where he came from or where he went. Sadly it was all but wiped out in 2003 fires, and all that's left now are stoves, knives and forks, rum bottles."
"Brace yourself, here come the roll-overs," hollers Davis as we approach the first of many mounds hacked into the steepest section of track to stop it washing away in downpours. "Our daughter reckons there are 198 of them," says Davis. "She counted them one hot day on the way down for a swim in the river."
I can confirm her maths is right, for I count them too, wishing as we hurtle down the side of each big dipper that perhaps I shouldn't have indulged in that fifth (or was it sixth?) scone.
To prove his point, we clamber up the old banks of the river to a tree which has the initials of Wellsmore's grandfather ''Ossie'', and his mate Donald McPhee, along with the number 34, carved into it. "They rode their horses down to record the height of the great 1934 flood," announces Wellsmore. With the roots of the historic tree a good 25 metres higher than the water level, it must have been some torrent they witnessed. "It would have roared like a freight train," exclaims Davis.
After an obligatory splash in the refreshing waters, we hop back in the car for the climb out of the valley. "Well that fella is a bit braver than you," quips Davis as we spot an echidna emerging from the water just upstream.
A few kilometres into the forest and near one of the Snowy's many tributaries we spot the comforting trail of smoke rising out of the chimney of a classic stockman's hut. Inside the rustic two-room wooden hut are Kerry's parents Don and Mildred who inherited the basic shelter after hermit bushman Ted Rogers died in 1964.
"Good 'ole Ted transported this hut from up the Snowy Plain in the 1930s and lived here much of his life" reveals Don, in a well-worn akubra and even more likeable high country drawl.
While tucking into some of Mildred's tasty chicken soup (from the camp oven, of course) and with attention to detail that defies his 82 years, Don regales us with stories of his ''ole mate Ted''. "Like the times when he'd get a lift with the mailman to the nearest pub in Dalgety, taking several days to stumble home". Or how he'd chase bees down to the river and throw flour on them to see what directions they'd fly so he could find their nest." He loved his honey," explains Don, "but he didn't always have the bread to put it on."
With tummies full, we face the long road back up to Box Ridge. "Don't worry, we won't subject you to all those roll-overs again," says Davis. "I know a short cut."
I don't find out just how short the return route actually is, for after a morning of fresh mountain air, a dip in the river and a hearty lunch, I've nodded off in the back seat.
If you are looking for a quintessential Australian high country experience then you'd be hard-pressed beating a day out with High Country Trails and Tucker.
Just remember to go easy on those scones.
Fact File
High Country Trails and Tucker: Travel the back roads into a secret world of natural wonders and iconic cultural heritage with dynamic duo Owen Davis and Karen Davidson. Choose from a range of personalised and group tours including high tea, bushwalks and overnight camps on their own property as well as into surrounding national park and wilderness areas. All tours Ex-Jindabyne. www.highcountrytrails-tucker.com or Ph: 0421 369 375.
Did You Know? Overlooking the Snowy River in Dalgety is the 1878 Catholic Church which is officially named Our Lady Star of the Sea – an odd choice for an inland church. Some believe it may have been so-named because during its construction the flow of the Snowy River may have sounded like the pounding sea.
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