Pierces Creek Forest: Murrays Hill and Black Hill

General Information

Grading:  medium

Distance:   10.3 kilometers

Total climb:   432 meters

Time taken:   2 hours 30 minutes

Maps:   Cotter Dam 8627-2N 1:25 000 and Tidbinbilla 8627-2S  1:25 000

Start point distance by road from Canberra GPO:   30 kilometers

Start point map grid reference:  55H FA 77363 84873

Destination map grid reference:  Murrays Hill - 55H FA 76311 84505
                                                     Black Hill - 55H FA 77303 83191

End point:  Same as start

Route

Description 

This walk began at the Murrays Corner picnic area off Paddys River Road, about 6 kilometres south of the Cotter Reserve. Left of the entrance to the picnic area is a management trail heading off into the forest.

I started walking up this trail through a mix of plantation pines and native trees, with thick fruiting blackberries hugging both sides of the trail. After about 1.5 kilometres, most of it gradually uphill, I came to an an intersection and turned to the left, continuing uphill around to the north of Murrays Hill and soon finding Murrays Creek on the right. I continued around to the west of Murrays Hill where the effects of the October/November 2018 Pierces Creek bushfire started to become apparent.

Some of the management trails marked on the map have disappeared, probably another effect of the bushfire, but I kept to the left, following the Murrays Hill/ Black Hill ridge above. Some of this was quite steep, but the road surface was good. With a clear view of Black Spring Mountain about 2.5 kilometres to the west...

...I turned east and made the final steep climb to the top of the ridge. Turning left at the top I made my way to Murrays Hill, which had some views towards Cotter Dam.

Heading back south along the ridge I made my way towards Black Hill. The trail gave some good views of the Tidbinbilla Valley and Tidbinbilla Range.

Eventually I reached the summit of Black Hill, but the tower shown on the map seems to no longer exist, possibly another casualty of the 2018 fire. Black Hill is at the southern border of Pierces Creek Forest, and this is marked by the appearance of a wire fence. The map shows the trail I followed up to the peak of Black Hill continuing down the other side and back to Paddys River Road. This has now been deliberately blocked off, but I was able to continue by climbing over a large fallen tree and found the remnants of the trail on the other side. This trail was quite narrow and extremely steep, and is obviously still used by dirt bike riders. The surface is very treacherous, mostly being a mixture of small rocks and powdery dust. 

It was fortunate that I brought two hiking poles with me, or I would have fallen many times on the way down. Embarrassingly the only time I did fall was when I was standing still and the surface just gave way beneath my feet - luckily a few scratches were the only physical injuries.

Eventually I made it back to Paddys River Road where I turned left and followed it for a short distance until I came to another management trail through the forest. This brought me back to Paddys River Road a short distance from my Murrays Corner starting point.