Mount Buller

Woke up in the morning nice and warm for the first time in a while.

After getting stuff done at Michaels and Morgans I headed off to Mansfield to order a swag. I had thought on it for the night and decided that it is probably a good buy, as it beats a tent in a lot of things. As I was commissioning something a bit more special I had to wait for a day for it to be finished, but I didn't mind that.

As I hadn't been up any of the surrounding mountains yet I set of towards Mount Buller but took a left turn prior to that, towards Mount Stirling. After driving uphill for quite a bit along windy forest paths I got a bit to far out for my liking. As I had gotten up rather late to, I turned around and stopped for a timelapse test in the forest.

After that I headed up towards the Mount Buller settlement. Basically a tourist settlement at the top of the mountain with expensive accommodations and bars. The road to the summit had been closed, due to the snow canons already being partially on and the staff getting everything ready for the winter season. Parking as far up as I could I didn't mind the extra exercise to get to the top. On the way I got my hands on some snow after not seeing any for one and a half years. It was such a nice reminder of all the sports I loved doing in winter that I enjoyed the cold numbness that came with the freezing wind blowing over the hands and the cool felling of the snow. Reaching the summit I had a cold wind blast around me, but got some really good pictures of the sun setting towards Melbourne. Also a really good view over the rest of the Australian Alps from the top of Mount Buller. 

For the most part I was alone at the top, but waiting for the sun to set I was greeted by five people my age that where working in the resort and a guy came up with his puppy dog.

After watching the sun go down, we all walked back down together. Most of the others where from Australia, but one girl was from Poland. Had a quick round of pool and a beer before heading back to Michael and Morgan. A few friends of theirs were coming round for dinner and I was running a bit late. Had some fun driving down the windy road and seeing how fast a two litre petrol motor can accelerate. Arrived back and only saw a kangaroo on the way, all the other animals they warn about (deer, koalas, lyrebirds) had decided to stay of the roads.

Had a fun night talking about a lot of stuff, but said goodbye to everyone as they had to get up early for work and then went to bed myself (the rabbit is still crazy).