During the night the weather changed. It rained and there was strong wind, a real storm. In the morning it still looked a bit rainy, so I put on my rain clothes.
That morning I felt like I had been walking for weeks, my legs were sore, my shoulders were swollen, I had light sunburn everywhere and my hands were slightly grazed. Hard to believe that this was the first official night on the Overland Track, still one week to go.
Around 9.30am I left Waterfall Valley, still there was strong wind and light rain sometimes, but after a while I put my rain clothes back in my pack, it was too warm and the rain was not worth wearing rain clothes.
It was a very nice walk between Waterfall Valley and Lake Will, even though it was mostly boardwalk, but nice scenery. Around 11am I was at the junction to Lake Will and when I arrived I noticed some currawongs leaving the scene and the contents of some backpacks were scattered everywhere, from sunglasses to medication. One of the medication packs looked broken and emptied, so I guess at least one of the birds didn’t make it past that day…
I left my pack on the platform at the junction and used the rain cover to protect it. I grabbed some snacks and went the short sidetrip to Lake Will. If it had been a little bit warmer, it would have been a perfect place for swimming, there are some small but nice beaches at the lake, worth staying for a while.
The rest of the walk was fairly easy because it was mostly flat. Around 2pm I arrived at Windermere hut, just when it started to rain. So I went into the hut and prepared something to eat. I wasn’t sure if I should pitch my tent or sleep inside the hut, but 2 hours later when I was finished with eating the weather turned into beautiful sunshine again. I then decided to sleep in my tent again, but it turned out to be quite difficult to fix it on the tent platforms. Fortunately some guy was able to help me out with string.
It was only a short walk but absolutely everything on my body hurt now, legs, feet, shoulders… When I looked at the map I was almost scared, so far I only walked a tiny bit of the track, and the next day would be the most difficult one, with at least 5 hours of walking to Pelion, and the last part being a steep climb.
After I pitched my tent I grabbed my camera and went for a walk along Lake Windermere, I was lucky to see another wombat just when it crawled out of its hole. Back at the tent site there were quite a few wallabies around my tent, they seem to be well used to people.
