Cathedral Ranges Nth Circuit

After arriving at Cook'sMillCampground after dark the night before, it was a little daunting waking up next to the large mountain that confronted me as I opened the swag a little before 7 am. A chilly 5°C night had left the fire all but out, but we soon had it defrosting our fingers as we had brekky and a cuppa.
With the St.Bernard's Track conveniently located right next to our chosen campsite, we managed to have everything packed and hitting the track by 7:45 am.
St.Bernard's Track is a relatively steep 1.5km, Grade 3 trail that joins the campground to the Jawbone Carpark. As we neared the carpark we could hear a Lyrebird mimicking it's bush mates (and something that sounded like Space Invaders) before we managed to catch a glimpse of him about 10 metres off track.
From the carpark its a steep descent down some well-formed stairs along Jawbone Creek Track (1.4km Grade 4) into Maclennan's Gully before an equally steep and challenging walk up towards the Ridge Track. Before reaching the track there is a detour to your right that will take you to the beginning of North Jawbone Peak Track which is a 700 metre Grade 3 climb upto a very impressive viewpoint.
After descending back down, the detour continues North and meets up with the Ridge Track, which in its entirety is a 3.8km Grade 5 track following the ridgeline. Impressive views are on both sides of you as you follow the ridgeline, with many magnificent photo opportunities available (it pays to also turn around occassionally to check the view behind you too!).
The Ridge Track takes you to an intersection with Cathedral Track (650m Grade 4) that takes you through Ned's Saddle. Today we ignored that option as we were aiming to reach the peak of The Cathedral at 840m, just 100m further on.
From the peak, the views are no more amazing than those already witnessed, but there's something special about climbing that last 100m to know you've reached the highest point of the North Circuit.
From here, we chose to push on along the Ridge Track to North Cathedral Peak where there is a historical Trig Point, and on further to Little Cathedral Peak. Being the Northern tip of the range, the views at Little Cathedral Peak are a little different, a little special, as the ground falls away from you in 3 directions. Here we saw a pair of Wedge Tailed Eagles, soaring high above Ned's Gully Campsite and making their way towards the the next highest peak to the East (presumably Chapel Hill).
It was surprisingly downhill from here along Little Cathedral Track for only a few 100 metres before the ascent began again until we met the intersection of Ned's Gully Track and Ned's Peak Track.
Never shying away from a detour, we made the climb uphill to Ned'sPeak (250m Grade 4) but this was the least favorite detour of the weekend, with only glimpses back towards the ridgeline available from here.
After this last detour, it was homeward bound down Ned's Gully Track (2.2km Grade 4). This was quite steep in parts, often winding back on itself to reduce the pain you'd feel if trudging up here from Ned's Gully Campground. The track leads you to another intersection, this time the crossroad between Ned's Gully Track, Little River Track and the detour to the nearby Ned's Gully Campground (Photo available). A quite open campground not far from Little River.
The last part of our hike was the long flat section along Little River Track. There were one or two glimpses of Little River along here and a nice track down to the water's edge, but it soon met up with a vehicle access track making the last kilometre or so a little boring.
I must say it was nice to round the final bend and glimpse the campground where my chair awaited me.
A quick celebratory beer was enjoyed, before we all went to soak our achingjoints in the flowing water of Little Creek. However, that was short-lived,as the water was icy cold and was more like an ice bath than an enjoyable soak, and it wasn't long before we all deemed the water temperature unbearable any longer.
This was a very physically demanding walk, taking in 15+km over a 7 hour period with many rests and some lost time searching for Geocaches. After doing the South Circuit the following day, I'dsay both Circuits are as challenging as each other (perhaps the South Circuit edging out the North Circuit due to the rock scrambling and mental awareness required there).
I hope you enjoyed reading my adventures and that it's prompted you to explore this awesome area.