I walked in this part of Kosciusko National Park in October 2024 with an NPA group led by Richard Thompson. However these notes are entirely my work and my responsibility. They are a supplement to the map, not a replacement. This is a first-hand account except where noted. Hut names are given as they appear on the Kosciusko Huts Association web site. Daveys Hut is often written `Davies Hut'.
In these notes I usually try to cover a general area rather than one specific walk. However, there is just one route to follow in this case, at least for those (like me) who are new to this area. The first part of the walk, from Gungarlin River Campground to Kidmans Hut, would be an excellent choice for gaining experience with off-track full pack walking. You can easily walk it in a day, and walk back the same way next day. The second part, from Kidmans Hut to Mawsons Hut, is suitable only for experienced off-track walkers.
I classify the vegetation on this walk into three types: snowgrass, meaning open grassland which can be easy to walk over, but also can be tussocky or boggy; low scrub, which is scrub of any height low enough to see over; and forest, which means trees, often with scrub, rocks, and fallen limbs underneath.
The walk begins at Gungarlin River Campground, an NPWS campground on the Gungarlin River on the eastern edge of Kosciusko National Park. Our satnav guided us there without any problems, but here are directions, just in case, plus information about road conditions. The last eight kilometres are rated by NPWS as four-wheel drive only.
Starting from the road between Berridale and Jindabyne, about halfway between those two places, turn off at the `Kalkite --- Eucumbene Road' signpost. You are now heading north on Eucumbene Road, a sealed minor road. After travelling for about 16 kilometres, you will reach the junction with Rocky Plains Road. This road offers a short cut when travelling from Cooma (turn right before Berridale at the `Eucumbene Dam --- Rocky Plains Road' sign). Continue north on Eucumbene Road for another four kilometres, to a point where it bears right. Turn left there at the `Nimmo Road --- No Through Road' signpost.
You are now heading north-west on Nimmo Road, a rough, unsealed two-wheel drive road. Follow this for eight kilometres, down to and across the Nimmo Heritage Bridge over the Eucumbene River and up the other side. There are side roads leading to farms but the main route is clear. At the end of the eight kilometres you will be at the top of a forested hill (often called Nimmo Hill), underneath high-voltage power lines, at an important junction where the main route turns right, or you can go straight ahead. If you go right, you end up on the long drive north-west up the Gungarlin River valley (called Snowy Plains) through private property (but on a public fire trail) to the national park boundary near Cesjacks Hut. That is not our way today.
Instead, go straight ahead down the hill, following the power lines and the sign that says `Island Bend Fire Trail' (it might also say `Powerline Trail'). Carry on for eight very bumpy and hilly kilometres, through one or two farm gates that you have to open and shut, paralleling the high-voltage power lines, to a bridge where the way is blocked by a locked boom gate. You've reached the Gungarlin River at Gungarlin River Campground. There is a small day use area on the right (we parked there), and a larger camping area (on-line booking required) away to the left.
This last eight kilometre stretch is rated by NPWS as four-wheel drive only, and trying it with a two-wheel drive vehicle would be risky. It's bumpy, and there are several steep bits that a two-wheel drive might get down but not up.
Nimmo Road and Island Bend Fire Trail are public roads, and Gungarlin River Campground and the entire walk are in the national park. So you won't trespass onto private property if you access the walk this way.
A short distance below the top of Nimmo Hill, you pass another right turn that your satnav might label `Teddy's Creek Fire Trail'. This is the Teddy's Creek Fire Trail that you will be walking on later. But turning here would take you across private property, so don't.
The best camp sites are Gungarlin River Campground and at the huts (Daveys Hut, Kidmans Hut, and Mawsons Hut). There are pit toilets at Gungarlin River Campground, Daveys Hut, and Mawsons Hut. Daveys Hut has no water, so if you plan to camp there, pick up water at the creek crossing about a kilometre before you get there. Kidmans and Mawsons Huts have short foot tracks to good water. Every creek on your map will have water.
Climb over the locked boom gate and cross the bridge to the western side of the Gungarlin River. After a few metres, turn right onto a fire trail heading north up the valley, which is wide and flat, and open snowgrass. After two kilometres you will come to a track junction, with the left branch going to Daveys Hut, clearly visible on the hillside a short distance away. Carry on straight ahead. After another kilometre, the fire trail crosses a boggy creek then bends left and heads west.
Soon after the bend there is a not very obvious track junction. Straight ahead (west) is the western part of Teddy's Creek Fire Trail. This is the way you go. To the right (north) is the eastern part of Teddy's Creek Fire Trail, leading (according to my map) across private property, back to the turnoff you passed on the Island Bend Fire Trail.
Carry on along the western part of Teddy's Creek Fire Trail. At first this leads up the ridge between Campbell's Creek and Teddy's Creek, out of the open valley and into forest. Later it descends to Teddy's Creek and crosses it twice, then bends left and climbs a forested ridge, ending adjacent to a pronounced snowgrass gap where a tributary of Teddy's Creek runs east back the way you came, and a tributary of the Burrungubugge River runs west down to Kidmans Hut. This important gap has no name on my map. Some call it Brassy Gap. Others call it Little Brassy Gap, which is the name I will use. Your mobile phone will probably work here.
Up to this point the whole route has followed clear fire trails. There is some faintness across the open snowgrass in the main (Gungarlin) river valley, but, contrary to anything you may have read, there is absolutely no difficulty in following this route, all the way to Little Brassy Gap, where Teddy's Creek Fire Trail ends. There is even an NPWS signpost in the forest on the way up, saying that you are entering the Jagungal Wilderness Area.
Kidmans Hut is two kilometres west of Little Brassy Gap, on the northern side of the large valley that you get to by descending the small valley on the western side of Little Brassy Gap. The bottoms of both valleys are mostly low scrub with some snowgrass, and the hut is visible at times from some way off, so it would not be hard to find your way even if there was no track.
In fact there is a track, although it is faint and you might well lose it at some point. To start, walk from the end of the fire trail onto the middle of the gap. Then follow a couple of stone cairns downhill to the west. You should be able to pick up the track there. It goes down the centre of the valley at first. Later it crosses the stream (on two steel struts) to reach the northern side of the valley bottom. Soon after that it enters the forest on the northern side of the valley. Someone has cut back the scrub layer to make a cleared route which takes you nearly to the bottom. There you re-enter open ground and cross one or two small creeks, keeping near the northern side of the valley bottom. Somewhere there you should see the hut.
Kidmans Hut is in the valley of the Burrungubugge River. It might be possible to continue by walking down this river, to where it is crossed by the Island Bend Fire Trail, then following that trail, either back to Gungarlin River Campground, or on across the Snowy River (there is a bridge) to Island Bend. I wouldn't undertake this lightly: it's five kilometres down the river without a track to Constances Hut (burnt down in 1984 and not replaced, according to the Kosciusko Huts Association web site), followed by another four kilometres on a track (probably non-existent) to the fire trail. I've heard that this route is affected by bushfire regrowth.
This part of the walk is much more challenging than the other. It should be attempted only by experienced walkers. It took us five hours one way. You'll need GPS and a set of waypoints, at least on the first trip, because you are bound to lose your way once or twice, and without waypoints there is no good way to find it again. And if you return the same way, you need a way to find the point where the route drops off the Brassy Range.
Greg Hutchison supplied us with waypoints that we used, very successfully, for this part of the walk. He's kindly made them available for these track notes. You can get a PDF map of the route here, you can get a GPX file here, and you can read Greg's bushwalking blog here. Thanks Greg, and thanks Richard for help with the files.
The first half of this part takes you from Kidmans Hut to the start of the open high country at the top of the Brassy Range. There is a foot track of sorts all the way. It begins by heading straight up the forested ridge behind Kidmans Hut. After a few hundred metres it takes a sharp left turn and crosses the lower ends of a couple of ridges, mostly though forest, eventually arriving at one of the major tributaries of the Burrungubugge River: not Dead Horse Creek but the one before it, which my map calls the (upper) Burrungubugge River but other maps give no name to. The track then turns right and proceeds up the northern side of this creek through low scrub to a large flat area of low scrub half-way up the range. It then turns left across the creek, traverses the southern side of the large flat area, goes up a forested ridge, and emerges onto the open high country. Your mobile phone will probably work at the top here. The track does not go to upper Dead Horse Creek like the track (also probably non-existent) shown on some maps.
The early part, between Kidmans Hut and the creek, is the hardest to follow. Things improve after that: there are cairns and a rough track all the way up the creek and across the large flat area, a fairly clear path up the forested ridge, and a cairn at the start of the open country at the top.
The second half of this part takes you from the start of the open high country across to Mawson's Hut. The country is open (a mixture of snowgrass and low scrub, with a few patches of forest on the rocky ridges), but that doesn't make it simple.
First, navigation is not easy. There is no track, and one bog or scrubby ridge or small gap looks much like another, even on a clear day. The only good landmarks are the Big Brassy, which is some way off, and Valentine Creek, which you don't see until near the end. Mawsons Hut is out of sight across Valentine Creek in a patch of forest on a ridge leading up to the Kerries. However a couple of snow poles on Valentine Creek near the bottom of that ridge give away its location. They also mark a good crossing point.
Second, off-track walking is tiring in the open high country. The flats are boggy and the ridges are rocky and scrubby. The best walking is usually along the valley sides just above the bogs.
Before returning the way we came, we took a day return trip across to Valentine Hut. So here's a brief description of that route. It is the first stage of the easiest way out in bad weather.
There is no track. Walking from Mawsons Hut to Valentine Hut along the ridges would be very rocky and scrubby. Following Valentine Creek would be a long way round, boggy at first, and very rocky and scrubby at the end, where the creek runs in a narrow valley.
The route we took was two hours each way but probably best; it is snowgrass a lot of the time. Heading west, cross the north-facing valley immediately adjacent to Mawson's Hut, then sidle around the north face of its western ridge, keeping above the bog and below the scrub. This brings you to a second, much larger north-facing valley. You need to get across or around that to a gap on its south-western side. Over that gap is a valley running west. Walk down that valley until just before it turns north and narrows, then exit to the west and push through a small amount of thick scrub until you emerge onto the fire trail a hundred metres or so above Valentine Hut.