Participant Name Member Number Vehicle Details

We all met at Angelo ’ s Bakery Bacchus Marsh at 830am . everyone was on time and after a quick briefing we head off to locate the Golden Duke Mine .

Only knowing a rough location of the mine from a well known online source called Facebook , we started heading down the wrong track , this made a great first impression on the trip leaders behalf ( oops )

We made a quick three point turn and moved up another 50 meters where we found the road leading the the Golden Duke mine .

After some happy snaps we made our way to Colbrook reservoir off the main track . Along the way found an interesting track called ‘ Pipe Track ’, simple in the dry , with a hill climb and with some ruts the whole way up , this would defiantly be challenging in the wetter months . Some of the small puddles along this track made little Soren ( 6 ) a little excited ! We arrived at the reservoir and grabbed some morning tea , it was great to see the reservoir at 100 % capacity , would make for a great camping spot .

From Colbrook reservoir we set off to look for another mine . Poters track was the most direct way , well according to the GPS and my map ( wombat state forest touring guide 4th edition ) after a right hand turn i realised ... where did potters track go ? i think the maps are a little out dated and could user a review ! Luckily i called this trip ‘ explore wombat ’ and after a slight detour we made our way to rat hole track .

Keeping our eyes peeled for a mine , we found one fenced off and still in operation , unfortunately we were unable to explore this one .

We started to make our way to Nolan Creek picnic ground , as we go to the end of pine track we found ourselves on the wrong side of quite a large bog . the center was quite deep and the top layer felt a little soft , we all agreed the best option was to take one wheel on the side with the left hand side in the deep . After a bit of planning the Pajeros threw the sacrificial Toyota in the deep but luckily for me it was uneventful . It still made for some great photos and one excited 6 year old who apparently loves mud .

After being set back some time due to the bog we decided to take the main roads straight to Nolan Creek picnic ground for lunch . We checked the map and decided to look another mine . This particular mine was located down Easter Monday track , once we arrived at the Easter Monday Mine we realised we had hit gold . It was a fantastic mine in great condition , Soren put his head torch on , braved the bugs at the entrance and made his way through the mine ( video uploaded to the Facebook page ).

According to both my maps there was a small track that would take us back to the main road , this track had some challenges with a good hill decent and some tight obstacles to avoid . Once we were at the bottom of the hill it clicked .... Wait , isn ’ t that the mine we were just at ? Yep we had just completed a loop , Luckily Rod happened to be in front so i could put the blame onto him , but it was all great fun .

Overall it was a great trip with some great company , i think we all had a bit of fun . ( keep an eye out for part 2 later in the year ) Trevor Smith # 1821

© Vol 34 No . 2 - March 2017