Wendy had organised this trip to Hat Hill Canyon at Blackheath on Boxing Day. We were joined by Keith and Steph.
It is a short walk in to the start of the canyon – the first constriction. This is short and nice. There had been bush fires in the area the previous summer but the creek itself is not too badly burnt.
Then it is not too far downstream to the second constriction. I told the others in the party about a trip I had been down this creek back in the 1970’s when we had encountered a huge wall of foam at the constriction. It had been whipped up by the turbulence in the creek from the very badly polluted water. At the time there was a sewage treatment plant upstream and the treatment was far from satisfactory. Keith told us we should be thankful that a former local member of the NSW Parliamant, Bob Debus, had insisted that The Sydney Water Authority pump the sewerage elsewhere for treatment and not pollute the Blue Mountains National Park. The creek is certainly in much better condition now.
It is a longer walk down to the third and last constriction. But the creek is very pleasant and open walking for the most part. On a sunny pebble bank we spotted a beautiful Tiger Snake sunning itself.
Then the creek enters a bouldery section before the constriction begins. We quickly went through this section of canyon. I was disappointed that the lighting was very poor for photography – far too harsh.
There are exits below and above this constriction and I suggested that after having lunch at the cliff line, that we go back up through the constriction as the light may be better for photos. The others thought this was reasonable and as it turned out – the lighting was far better. I managed to obtain some reasonable photos of the canyon formation, even though I only had with me a small camera and a tabletop tripod.
At the cliff line I had a scout around. The creek tumbles over a fair sized waterfall. I had heard that there is a pass nearby. It looks like one may be possible about 5m to the true left of the waterfall – but it looks a bit steep and dodgy. There didn’t seem to me to be any other possible routes without abseiling.
After going back up through the lower constriction, we climbed back through the boulder section and then up an easy gully on the east to eventually gain the Hat Hill Ridge walking track.
After the canyon, we headed back to Blackheath for refreshments and then did a little storm watching at Govetts Leap Lookout.
More photos of the canyon on my website here.
Looks like an hour say pass up the left to me. Obviously you weren’t trying hard enough Dave!
That should read ‘easy pass’ – the joys of auto correcting email 🙁
No – the “pass” is a gully (an easy to walk out of gully)