There’s certainly a badly-burnt landscape in places. Just the occasional bird call in the deathly silence.
Yesterday, I visited Col at the Adaminaby Angler, arriving right on coffee time. The town was empty. Not a single car parked from the pub to the bakery, and down past the real estate. Our plan was to head up the Snowy Mountains Highway towards Tumut and check out the Eucumbene River after the fires. A sample of pictures follow but here are a few headlines.
The Kosciusko National Park is still closed. You can drive to Tumut but all backcountry areas are still closed. Tantangara Road is closed. The Link Road to Selwyn and Cabramurra is closed.
Adaminaby, Cooma, Berridale, and Jindabyne are open and need your support. Lake Eucumbene is open and largely not fire affected. The Eucumbene river at Providence is not affected so there is probably 10 kilometres of river from the tree line to the lake that looks amazingly fishy. The Alpine Way is still closed but check with RMS regularly as it should open soon. Check with NPWS before planning anything off-road.
The campgrounds around Lake Eucumbene are slowly opening their gates again and if the weather forecast holds, we will get some good rain in the next week which will cool things down and improve things dramatically (not least of all the fishing). Buckenderra is expecting to be fully open by this weekend.
Right now, Adaminaby in particular, like many small towns that are heavily rely on seasonal tourists, really needs you to get down there and spend as much in town as you can. There’s a good supermarket, bakery, the Snowgoose Hotel, and believe it or not, after a hard day on the river you can now even get a pedicure and a massage – right after you’ve bought $50 worth of flies from Col at the tackle shop. There’s even an op shop to support the Hydro museum
A quick lake report. Eucumbene is at 27.3% and stable with good catch reports from all over the lake – daphnia-filled rainbows, chunky mudeye feeders; midge action; and stick caddis-feeding browns; Jindabyne at 79.7 and trending down with very few reports; Tantangara at 8.6% and flatlining now the portal into Eucumbene is shut off – and the Tantangara Road into the lake is closed anyway.
Eucumbene River at Kiandra Bridge.
Tantangara Road closed for the time being (and needing a new sign).
Eucumbene River upstream of Kiandra Bridge.
Green shots from the tussocks a week after the fire.
Why the back country is still closed.
Eucumbene River at Providence – plenty of hoppers in the grass.
Says it all really.
