Abercrombie National Park

Situated aproximatley 55km south of the town of Oberon in the Great Dividing Range, the Abercrombie River National Park, is both beautiful and a great place for trout.
On the weekend we decided to try our luck (and skill) and see what we could find. My last trip here was 12 years ago and it was a near disaster. I took the family and was towing an off road trailer with a landcruiser.
The track that leads down to the River is vewry steep. Interestingly enough the track simply ends at the river. No turning circle, it just ends. A river on one side and a verticle embankmenton the other. On that particular trip I had to unload the trailer and to dangle it over the edge in an attempt to turn around. It took about a 20 point turn to succeed. I then had to ferry the trailer and family up the steep rock strewn track ( about 2km in length), in 40c heat to the top. The track was loose and the trailer forced the back of the Cruiser to slew from side to side. The track was very loose back then.



The river. More like a stream in this part

The trip this time was easier as the new Cruiser has more power, no trailer and the track surface was in better condition. However the track was just as steep and again there is little area to turn in once you reach the bottom.
The river itself is beautiful, tall trees, clear pools and water dancing over rocks. It was a little shallow, but still we walked and had a go in the deeper pools and eddies. A storm came over and we chose to leave before the track became wet- memories of 12 years ago came back pretty quickly!

On this trip we saw- australian magpie, chrimson rosella, grey fantail, superb fairy wren, sulphur crested cockatoo, turquoise parrot, little button quail, noisey minor, bell minor, lyrebird, weebill, pacific balck duck, common bronzewing, willy wagtail, pee wee, yellow tail cockatoo, firetail finch, glossy black cockatoo, black kite, white wing chuffs, black faced cuckoo shrike, masked lapwing, friarbird.

We also saw- tiger snake, stinky swamp wallaby, eastern grey kangaroo , and a rainbow trout

The Tiger snake. Has the most toxic poison of all snakes, but its smaller fangs prevent it from being the most deadly.

We decided to drive to the fish river and try our luck there as well. In a previous post we camped along this river and the trout were abunadant. After about an hour a storm again hit and lightening was striking the paddocks a short distance from where we were fishing. Fly rods and lightening dont mix, and we raced back to the car, narrrowly avoiding a tigersnake as it moved reluctantly off the track.

Both David and I had a great day, a great trip into the national park within the Great Dividing Range. After about 12 hours of fishing and walking we were home. The Wildlife we saw, the bird life and the country side made this a great way to relax, even though the fishing was intereupted.

We vowed we would be back in March, and catch that rainbow trout that so eluded us.

(More photos to come as soon as I get my bluetooth to work again)