Whungee-Wheengee Canyon
Friday, January 11th, 2008
Open my book of favourite canyons ever, and stick Whungee-Wheengee straight on top of the list. I had such a great time doing Whungee-Wheengee that I am sure I will be back many times in the near future, and will probably even do a Serendipity-Whungee-Wheengee double day of awesomeness sometime too, just to cram as much incredible canyoning into one day as possible.
Stewart from the UNSW Outdoors Club ran this trip, and he took Su Li and myself on this adventure through one of the most interesting, and sustained canyons I have ever done. From start to finish, you are having a good time. The canyon stays narrow, stays beautiful, and stays interesting the whole way down to the ‘gambe. And then when its over, you get to bask in the sun as you float down the ‘gambe, reflecting on all of the cool stuff you just did!
For example, the first thing we did in the canyon, was climb down into a pool, swim 5m, then swim UNDER a chockstone, pop up on the other side where things were getting darker, then swim a few more meters in a very very narrow section only to find another chockstone which we had to swim under. Because we couldn’t see any light on the other side of the chockstone, we weren’t certain that we were in the right spot, so Stewart pulled out his headlamp and went under first (luckily there was a bit of a gap between the water and the chockstone, so we could get light through.) It looked like there was room on the other side of the chockstone, so we swam under. Boy am I glad we did - you duck under this rock, swim a meter, then come back up for air only to find yourself in a pitch black cave with a roof covered in glow worms. It felt like I had just stumbled into a planetarium and I was meant to be looking up at the starry night sky… A hint of light up ahead then turned into dim beams of light pouring in through a tunne, creating another incredible light/dark effect which I only wish I could capture on film somehow to show everyone.
And that was the first thing we did in the canyon. I was immediately blown away by it. And while there were no more super cool duck under glow worm caves, the canyon still continued to impress simply because it stayed to perfect the whole time. There was no boring creek walking bits, and no ‘connecting’ bits as you find in most canyons, Whungee-Wheengee was canyon from top to bottom. No filler. Lots of great swims, often through ridiculously narrow slots, several duck unders, lots of great light beams filtering down through the narrow canyon walls, illuminating ferns that bright green.
Even the hard bits were good fun. Graded at a 5, I expect that simply comes from the difficulty and regularity of the climb downs, overs and arounds. Rock climbing experience definitely helps in this canyon, the ability to jump onto small slippery surfaces without falling off the edge, and a reasonable ability to not be too scared by heights are all highly recommended traits. Even with those, you won’t find the going through Whungee-Wheengee ‘easy’ - you have to pay attention the whole way through the canyon.
That said, the abseils aren’t very difficult. There was an initial one to get down into the creek, then shortly after the duck unders we did a second abseil which I think you can avoid by climbing down a difficult bit. The last two abseils are unavoidable and follow rapidly one after the other. Once at the bottom of the last abseil, it is only a short walk to Wollangambe Two, but even that short walk is incredible - it is walking through this 1m wide slot with 50m vertical walls straight up either side of you. It is quite a surreal place to be. And then suddenly it goes around a corner and we found ourselves stepping into the bathwater temperature of the Wollangambe. Well maybe it wasn’t bathwater temperature, but it sure was a *lot* warmer than the frigid waters of the Whungee-Wheengee.
We had a second lunch on the side of the Wollangambe as the group behind us through Whungee-Wheengee overtook us, then we caught up to them again around the corner where they had all started jumping in from a side cliff. Stewart and I had a jump each, then we meandered our way down to the end of the canyon, then up the long and slow climb out.
Awesome canyon, everything about it is perfect. Just make sure you are physically capable and with someone who has done it before if you want to try it. And never try to do it in high water or with a threat of a thunderstorm. Those duck unders could be quite dangerous if the water was any higher.
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