Boxvale Tramway track

 

Box Vale tramway track with my friend Peggy! We did the whole loop from Box Vale carpark to Mittagong lake Alexandra. The walk from the carpark to Nattai gorge lookout was very easy, it was mostly very well formed fire trails so we didn't know that was the only well paved part of the whole track! Nonetheless the lookout was amazing! 

We could see the whole Nattai national park area, we enjoyed our lunch there while looking over the valley. We reached the Box Vale old tramline which were used for coal mining, now it is just an empty tunnel! 

The way that led to Boxvale tunel

Next part came the incline - which was also used to be used to transfer coal, this was when the track started to get hard, we had to either slide down on our butt or using the guide rope to made our way down the around 700m deep incline. 

After that there were no visible track. We arrived at Box creek and since the track was completely covered by branches from earlier bushfires, there were no visible pathway. Luckily, we used the map that we took at the beginning of the track and figured our way to the junction of Box creek and Nattai gorge. 

From there we located the track by a combination of using the map and the marking tapes that were sometimes visible at some tree branches. 

 

A natural arch!

We reached the forty foot fall before nearly get lost in one of the turns. The falls were amazing but we didn't get too close for the fear of possibilities of getting to the lake too late and miss the train. 

 

Climbing up to the top of the falls, we couldn't find which way to go since even the map wasn't very clear at this part, luckily a local group showed us the way to lake Alexandra. 

 

After some more off track walks because of mistakenly taking a wrong turn, we finally reach lake Alexandra right before sunset. We had a break there, talking about our next trip while watching the sun.