Panorama Hill - Sat. 27th September 2014

The walk:  This Sat. 27th Sept - the destination is Panorama Hill, on the Western Tiers alongside the Lake Nameless track. Your leader for the day is intrepid bushwalker Peter Davies. The walk, which begins at Westrope Road near Western Creek, consists of 500 metres (altitude) of steep climbing over 2 km of well-formed track to reach the escarpment at 1100 m altitude, and a further 3 km of open alpine plateau walking southwest, rising to 1260 metres altitude, mostly gradually, with a fairly steep climb (some boulders and scrub) rising a final 80 metres over the last 250 metres. The walk is rated "medium" due to the distance, steep sections and some off-track walking, but should not be difficult for reasonably fit people, including older children, who are familiar with alpine walking, and should take about 7 hours return, including breaks, bringing you back to the car park between 4 and 4:30 pm, depending on walking pace. Views (long range forecast is promising...) over the heart of the plateau and the many lakes of the area.

Meeting Times and Places:
If you are interested in going on this walk, please phone your walk leader, Peter Davies Ph. 6344 8235 to book in.
The departure time is 7:30 am from the Door of Hope Church car park, Launceston. Alternatively, you could meed the group at 8 am at Deloraine Train Park  as there are toilets there, or at Higgs Track Car Park 8:30 am. If you would like to arrange to meet the group at these places or elsewhere, please arrange with the leader, and please be at any meeting place 5 minutes ahead of the listed time.
The leader should always be notified of any other people you intend to bring along, and you should always contact the walk leader if intending to participate in a particular Boots N' All walk.

To access this area from northern Tasmania:
From Launceston, proceed along the Bass Highway to Deloraine (about 51 km), but do not turn off at the eastern exit into Deloraine. Instead, continue across Meander R. and up hill to the western exit, and to the roundabout at start of Mole Creek Rd. Continue on Mole Creek Rd. about 8 km and turn left into Dairy Plains Rd. Go all the way through Dairy Plains Rd. (several right hand turns and 2 junctions where you need to follow the signs). When you arrive at the T junction with Western Creek Rd, turn right and 800m further on, turn left up Westrope Rd. Go more or less straight for 4 km south, to reach the junction of Dale Brook Rd. which turns off to the right. The car park for the walk is about 500 metres from Westrope Rd. Westrope Rd. is all gravel, and somewhat degraded in parts, but should be accessible for 2WD vehicles with reasonable clearance.

Warnings:
The highest point of Panorama Hill is almost 1300 metres above sea level, reached by crossing an exposed alpine plateau.
E    Exposed alpine conditions – can be dangerous in poor weather if not fully equipped (You must be equipped for poor conditions even if the weather forecast is promising).
S    Steep incline for at least part of the way
M    Marshy or muddy sections – be prepared to walk with wet feet.
If you are unsure of equipment requirements, Visit the Boots N' All section of the sutas.org.au website per link below and read "Clothing suggestions for exposed conditions"

Map details:
Caveside Prospect: 1:100000 map is Mersey (Tasmap 8114) and 1:25000 map for upper area is Lake Mackenzie (TasMap 4438).
Map reference:
Short ref. n/a
Zone      Easting        Northing    Latitude      Longitude
55G    4 52 410    53 83 960    -41.69472    146.42809

Panorama Hill is not a peakbagger point. For listing of peakbagger points, see the Hobart Walking Club Peakbagger's Guide (2000 revision) which can be found and downloaded (as an Excel spreadsheet) from http://tastracks.webs.com/peakbaggers.htm  The same web page contains several other listings of Tasmanian peaks.