Category: tasmania

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Bobs 2015 i Sept

Mt Bobs and the Boomerang. Neither, and in two days.

Farmhouse Creek, the famous.
“BOBS?? THIS weekend?” queried our amazed and knowledgeable friends when my husband explained my absence from the gym. They knew the full implications of an immediately post-winter attempt on Bobs, especially having just returned from sludging their way around their own, lower and less southerly mountain, where they had found the going slow and hard. They were right. Bobs was pretty bad – and they had retreated from their mountain before the rains began.Day one was not a booming success. Unfortunately Friday morning was the earliest I could get away, which was one day too late for the window of opportunity that gave three dry days for Bobs. And it certainly didn’t help that, with one thing and another, we didn’t leave the carpark at Farmhouse Creek until 10.45. If these suggest to you a lack of respect for the worthy Bobs, you are probably right. We have learned due respect now. Perhaps we also needed more deference for the amount of water that must have accumulated after the kind of snow dumps we’ve had these last few months. However, my climbing partner has personal reasons for trying to collect as many Abels as he can before Christmas, and we both enjoy giving things a go, so there we were. Our third accomplice in mischief would have also given it a try had she not been required to be at work on Saturday. She was at home consoling herself with wine. Perhaps this was not a bad idea.

It was very exciting for me to see the famous Farmhouse Creek up close. A frisson of delight coursed through me just thinking of the many connotations this stream holds in its compass. The pad to the right, immediately after crossing the bridge, was clear enough most of the time. We were delighted to be underway and chatted furiously, making up for several months of not seeing each other, exchanging news and stories, enjoying the pellucid, whisky-coloured gurgling mass beside us and the almost lurid green forest as we made our way to the crossing of this now mighty river – swollen as it was – before we began our actual climb. Apparently one rises about 250 ms in this section, but it is not noticeable.

It’s quite a long way; I had had breakfast at 4.50 a.m.. On the dot of 12 I begged for lunch, and Mark was cool with that. There was a nice stream flowing, but I was told it was not Farmhouse creek, even though it seemed pretty big. There were quite a few mud puddles, which increased in number and size as we went along, but – and now I can speak in hindsight – the going was pretty good in this section: just a few fallen logs and trees to climb or attempt to skirt; what you’d expect on a longstanding, unmaintained track.

The creek at the crossing point

The real fun began at the mud plain called by some “track junction”. Now, to have a track junction, you actually need at least two tracks, so I question this terminology. We did see a stick with two tapes on it, but we assumed it was just to announce “You are still on the track”. We did make explorations off to the left to make sure, but the slight suggestion of a pad was really too minor to be promoted to this status; the stick with tape was a stick and not a tree as the Abels book said, and we hadn’t been going long enough. This was a wily false pad. We were not fooled. On we went, chatting merrily. However, after some time (and the gps says about 700ms) we were climbing more contours than seemed reasonable amongst friends, so we did the gps the courtesy of a check (I had been trying to save battery by not overusing the screen). Alas it confirmed that the stick must have been the junction. My watch said this was not good news with respect to our broader hopes for the day. Back we went. When I visited the stick the second time and looked up high in the air, I saw that giants had indeed put more tapes there than either of us had noticed, focussed as we were on how deep our feet were sinking and other suchlike matters. The tapes were well above my eye level. We put a bright pink one just above where my eyes look for good measure, one that people like us could see.
There’s a creek crossing a bit on from there, so we stopped for a quick drink and to refill our bottles, and on we went, worried now about the time. The book Mark had said 3 – 3.5 hours to the campsite from here. It was exactly 3.5 hours until dark. Pitch dark, that is. Unfortunately, due to problems locating the vague thing glorified by the term “pad” in forest thick with newly fallen trees, branches and leaves following a winter that has been rather active in weather events, we spent more time in a game of ‘Pooh finds hephalumps’ than in making forward progress. There were also many mud ponds of unknown depth that we tried to evade down lower that prevented us breaking the world record on this occasion. Unless people document startling PWs.

Down low, beside Farmhouse Ck, where the way was clear. The track is the shiny bit, and there is visible tape. Higher up I think someone ran out. Tiny, tight bits of blue are what you mostly find, if you’re lucky. They’re sure better than nothing!!

Darkness – of the proper, pitch variety – set in as we were descending to what Chapman describes as a button grass valley. We found no button grass by dark or by day. Just more thick forest and deep, deep mud. When it’s very dark, sinking in deep mud is not a nice thought. Our pace slowed even further. The compass was now needed as the land gave us no clues. We were supposed to be in a valley heading SW. We could find SW on the compass, but no particular valley on the ground. Nothing that yelled: “I am a valley. Just stick to the lowest point and follow me up.” The pad, being now full of mud, was shinier than the non-pad, so we made a little cautious progress, but once we reentered the forest, the shine lost its sparkle and we were back playing Pooh and hephalumps again, circling tapes to try to find where the pad went from that point and making footprints to later get excited about. Simply heading SW was an even slower option in forest that tangled, so we only resorted to it when desperate (which we became at about 8.30).

We never did get to see the sinkhole, but we did see where one would lie were it not drowned. We retreated and found two tolerable spots for tents. It was now 8.45. As I was boiling water for dinner, Mark yelled out: “Hey Louise, I just found a tape in the tree above my tent. We’re on the track.” The rain began soon after that. I enjoyed listening to it beating on the tent as I very easily drifted into sleep.

There is a knoll where you get a view of the famous Federation Peak. What a thrill to be so near the Great One.

“Wake up, Louise.” The rude sound penetrated my dreams. But we had agreed on a 6 a.m. start. Outside, Mark was standing in the rain, offering me three alternatives: climb, wait a bit, or bail out.
“Bail out?” I almost yelled (well, actually, I think the volume was “yell”) in shock.
“Yes, the book says it’s four hours to the summit from here. That’s eight hours in the rain and mist with no view and hypothermic conditions.”
“And no line of sight on the helpful cliffs,” I chipped in. With each passing moment, this “bail out” notion was seeming like a fantastic idea. What an ingenious guy Mark is. Within two seconds I’d agreed to it.
“Can we sleep in ’til 7?” I asked hopefully. Affirmative. Life is good.
I rolled over to listen to the rain and just enjoy the state of being in a forest this wondrous with its trunks heavily laden in deep spongy layers of the best green. The scene out my vestibule was a wonderfully Tolkienish vista. (Alas, it was too dark and wet to photograph).

We had thought the trip back would be way faster than the trip in, with the wonders of vision added to the mix, and it was certainly quicker than our way there, but lighting-fast does not describe our speed. The amount of water that had fallen in a single night was truly astonishing. The mud puddles were now mud tarns. Divergences were extravagant to avoid a soaking. Why not just go through and get wet and be done with it? Because the depth of these puddles is unknown, and falling in up to your throat or high chest is actually a frightening experience. It requires great strength to get out again, and is rather cold and dirty to boot. Besides, I had my camera to protect, and my brand new (expensive) Anorak. I pussyfooted around cutting grass and scoparia in an attempt to have it last more than a single expedition.

Our lunch was had in the campsite just before the intersection – a nice clear place to put down the packs. It was a nice clear place for snakes, too. I have never before seen two snakes curled up together. I wanted to poke one with a stick, just to see what would happen, but decided against it. We both did go quite close, however, curious about this daring pair who appeared long before snake season was due to start. (The rain had now stopped). They seemed a little curious about us, too. We parted on good terms.


All up, we carried our packs for 16 hours, which includes all the errors – circling, prancing around puddles, swinging from trees, having several attempts at sliding up logs that were as high as my eyes but offered no way around or under, and other suchlike games. The time does not include eating or photos – the only time we gave our shoulders a break. We had three rests going up, two coming back – just long enough to throw a quick bit of food down and some water, and we were away again. We got to the car, dreaming of hamburgers or better, only to look at the watch and know that even Banjos would be closed by the time we got there. It was quarter to five. No hope.
32.5 kms. 800 ms climb (which does not include any of the climbing on the way back, or the climbing we did in error. Real climbing is more likely to be 1100ms).I was very tired driving home. Ironically, I kept awake by blasting out (and singing along with) Bellini’s opera, La Sonnambula (The Sleepwalker).
A 1:100,000 image of our route.

A 1:25,000 version. Note the huge discrepancy between the blue line of the pad, and the black of the map track. It is absolutely impossible to use the mapped black line of the track to determine the whereabouts of the track. If you can’t find the pad, there is no point in getting a gps reading of where you are and saying: “The track is to our right”, as the “track” (word used very loosely) could be absolutely anywhere. The bush is thick. It’s worthwhile trying to find the pad, if possible! We added a few more tapes when, and only when, we were certain we were on the official pad. 

 

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Clumner Bluff 2015 Sept

Not my photo. Neither is it my view (seeing’s I didn’t get one). This is a photo kindly sent to me by my friend David, taken from a snowy “summit B” under somewhat more ideal conditions than my own.

Clumnar Bluff. Hoorah. Sixth time lucky – if “luck” is what you call it. I have at last climbed you. Both summits. And what happened on the failed attempts? Is it a hard mountain? No, it is not hard at all, although I was starting to feel that it must be. So, what’s the story?
Time 1) It was frosty with icicles on the rock, so it was called off before we began, and we climbed a slippery, icy Mt Victoria instead. (It’s not as high).
Time 2) We got started, but didn’t even get half way. It was raining and cold, and our organiser was still recovering from an operation. We were obviously not going to make it, so we all opted for the comfort of the car and to the business of pulling leeches off ourselves while we drove back. The count was 42 leeches thrown out the window on the return trip.
Time 3) This trip was called off because of rain before we left our homes.
Time 4) I put my name on the list, but then discovered I had a clash and a trip organised up a more important mountain. That group made the top, but without me.
Trip 5) I was told we were skiing to Clumner Bluff. HOW exciting is that? I was thrilled. However, in the car on the way, I was told we were not going to Clumner at all.

This is also not my photo, but one offered to me by another friend, Catherine, showing me walking around a different lake on Wednesday. This is very similar to what we could have been seeing had we been able to see, or had the luxury of time to stop and take it.
Enough was enough. Obviously it seems, if you want a mountain dearly enough, you need to take matters into your own hands. I studied the weather and decided Friday was good enough for a try, despite the fact that either snow or rain was predicted for the afternoon (depending on the temperature). An early frost would at least mean that the snow would be firm for the way out. It would be several kilometres across the top once I’d climbed up to the snow, so I wanted to make sure of being out by midday, just in case it got slushy and slow, and in case sinking with every step became a possibility. It thus needed to be a trip with a nice early start, and one done on the march with very, very few stops, if any. Who would be up for such a trip? My friend Angela, of course. I was so annoyed with five failed attempts that I was prepared to go solo if she couldn’t come, but luckily for me, she could, so when the sky closed in and even the ground became difficult to see, I had the warmth of company.

Angela checking the summit. Sorry, it’s just a phone image. Beggars can’t be choosers. Having forgotten my camera, I had to learn to use my Galaxy, which won’t let me download onto my computer, so this got texted to my daughter and then emailed to me. Quality has been lost somewhere in all of that. Don’t be fooled by the shorts. It was COLD. Angela is tough!

Angela and I, as a duo, now have, by default, a very good – yea, pure – record of summitting success in the snow, and this mountain was no exception. I say “by default” as we don’t always set out intending to snow climb. It just happens to be the case. This time, however, the snow was sought out and courted. I thought it would be great fun to have my first summitting of this elusive mountain in winter white. The fact that it was also in a grey-out, done half-blind, just added spice.
At first the day seemed benign. I thought it would be another glorious one, like Wednesday. However, once we gained a contour or two and were exposed to winds coming from the west, we were hit with an icy blast, and quickly donned another layer to cope with the freeze. We were not deterred. It was chilling, but we also both had many more layers in our daypacks in case. To the west, the sky began to look dark and ominous. I checked my compass to note our bearing, as the land was almost featureless. The clouds were rolling in, and yet it was still so bright because of the snow that we both found our gps screens very hard to read; I was glad of the paper map and compass we were each also carrying. Somewhere in the clouds, Clumner Bluff was hiding, but it was a matter of belief, not of seeing – a belief based on the accuracy of map and compass, for the eyes told us nothing.

The wildness of the tops

The ground became exceptionally hard to discern. I changed from sunglasses to red-tinted ones, but I still couldn’t detect any helpful patterns in the snow that indicated where the ground was. Like a little old lady, I walked bending low to try to make out the ground. We crossed something we decided was a lake, treading very gently indeed as we crossed it. We had no idea how deep it was, or how stable the ice covering on top. I was so glad to have Angela’s company!!! On the return journey, we evaded that bit by doing a wide arc.
After maybe 50 minutes across the snow, a shadowy lump loomed up ahead. This must be Clumner Bluff. At last we come face to face. ‘Odyssea’ meets her giant. Up we climbed and exactly 60 minutes after cresting the snowy tops, we were standing on what we supposed was “summit B”. I assume this is the “historical summit”. However, even in the grey misty gloom, our eyes said there were higher things to our left (south). My old map told me nothing, as it lacked a black dot of any description for the summit, but Angela’s more modern map had a summit where our eyes said one should lie – apparently 10 meters higher than the one we were on. I really don’t know, and never will, if I would have had the courage to go even further into the dark mist and visually unknown without the company of a friend. I don’t need to know right now, as Angela agreed that we’d go on to touch the highest point, and not just this cairn and summit. It took us a further 15 minutes to reach it, but they were glorious minutes where we felt even wilder and freer than that first hour across the snowy plateau. Somehow or other this was the ultimate: wild and free on rugged eerie tops with wind so noisy we couldn’t hear each other speak; the only marks in the snow were wind waves and the tracks of wombats and wallabies. It was fabulous. And oh was it good to breast that summit rock and know we had at last got to the top of the runaway mount.

This was the clearest it got during a two hour period, which happened to coincide with when we were on the summit, and when we stopped for five minutes to celebrate before hastening away.

Here, after 2 hrs 15 mins walking from the car, we had our first break, if you call it that. I took four photos. Angela similar, and then we were away again. No food; no drink. We were still both in a hurry, as the weather really was quite nasty, and we both wanted to reach this nice thing called safety before we ate or drank or wasted any time. We had our first break from earnest progress, and I had my first drink and food of any description after 3 hrs 45 (12.15 pm), when we were successfully out of the snow, and about a quarter of the way back down the mountain. I had been right to think we needed to be out by midday. The snow had been a little sludgy towards the end. It started raining lightly as we tightened our seat belts to drive away, both feeling quite excited by the day’s adventure, and very, very satisfied with all that had happened.

Our walking route in blue. For instructions on how to get to the start, see the post before this one on XC skiing. We parked the 2WD just before the puddle, as suggested, 4.3 kms from the turn. At the puddle, you turn right, head up a steep section that 4WD cars with courageous drivers can do, until the tapes indicating the start. The additional walking resulting from parking that bit early meant we had to walk an extra 6 mins 45 to reach the carpark for the brave and well equipped.

For the first time in my very long life, I forgot to take my camera with me!!! It was in the car, but I thought it was in my pack. I realised 10 minutes into the walk that this was the case, but was not prepared to lose 20 mins getting it, given that I had calculated that we needed to be out by midday. As it was, our progress was so purposeful that I would possibly not have had time to use it apart from at the summit anyway. Wednesday was about photography; today was about business – if you call feeling the wondrous expanse of infinitude in nature’s wildness “business”.

16 kms; 500 ms climb = 21 km equivalents. 4 hrs 45 walking (plus lunch and four photos).

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XC skiing Central Plateau Mersey Crag 2015 Sep

A day of XC-skiing, on which I tried to reach Mersey Crag, but failed as my shoes fell to bits after 2kms.

Unnamed lake (on my map, anyway) about 2kms from the start 

Turrana Bluff and Mersey Crag from one of our many vantage points

I am so in love with yesterday, and with the opportunities that living in Tasmania provide. While the rest of the normal world went to work, a group of us who are free on Wednesdays, either by default or design (unemployed, partially unemployed, deliberately semiretired or fully retired – some of them early to enable a better lifestyle) went off into the wilderness and had a glorious day skiing or walking in the snow.

Turrana and Mersey again

My gear had had a long rest in my attic. While I was a representative athlete, I was unwilling to ski in the winter, which was my European racing season, just in case I got injured, so the gear just sat. Yesterday I got it out and carted it to the top of the central plateau (about 400 ms vertical climb – not a big deal) and began skiing for the first time in a very, very long time. I felt a bit nervous, but just as I was getting the hang of it again, my shoe fell apart – literally fell to bits. I had to walk in a shoe and a (luckily, woollen) sock back to where we had mounted the plateau and exchanged ski gear for the walking gear I’d worn to get to that point. While the others skied off to the glorious blue and white yonder, I was “stuck” in the snow for a day.

Well, as you know, I adore photography, and had already been lamenting the fact that I was skiing past scenes that I had wanted to represent in my own creative medium. Now I could fill my heart’s desire and snap away at all that beauty. I also had a fantastic workout, as when I was finished snapping, I walked a nice long way, nearly as far as Mersey Crag, some of which was with a “new girl”, Catherine, whose borrowed gear didn’t suit her. She abandoned it and came walking with me. Being up there in those vast domains, surrounded by a world of blue and white was a refreshing, rejuvenating experience. I can’t wait to go back. With fewer setbacks (clearing the road of fallen timber, broken gear and more) I am sure we can get to the top of Mersey Crag and back in a day using that route.

Weather closing in a bit as we all head back to the start
Is this not heaven on earth?
To get to the start, drive past Lake Rowallan, taking the Dublin Rd to the left (as for Rinadena Falls or Turrana Bluff), and then take the second road to the right, Clumner Spur road 2. Follow it for 4.3 kms until the drivable end of the road where there are tapes leading up to the plateau using the Henry Shannon track, named after the conceiver and maker of this route to the top, who skied with us yesterday. If you only have a 2WD, you have maybe 700ms extra to walk, maybe less. I didn’t measure, but I am going up next time in my 2WD as my 4 is out of action at present, and I don’t see this as a great hardship. Just stop before the muddy puddle.
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Collins Cap 2015 Aug

Russell Falls – not a bad alternative to playing in the snow.
With a good dumping of snow forecast for the weekend, it was hard to choose where to go to capitalise on this wonder. The best snow seemed to be for Mt Field, so we planned to go there. Luckily, I threw my Wellington Ranges map into the car, just in case. I say “luckily”, as we gave little forethought to the fact that we were going to the snow in a 2WD; that is not always a good idea. We don’t even own any chains that fit it. (Our 4WD was out of action this weekend).

Lady Barron Falls, looking very dramatic with so much water

I did actually get almost to the Lake Dobson Carpark, but there was a lot of snow, and I was nervous about hanging around. If conditions got one iota worse up there – which tends to happen in snow storms – then we were in a pickle. We retreated, admired (and photographed) two wonderful waterfalls, and then drove to Hobart, resorting to my plan B for the morrow, which was to climb Collins Cap.

I was rather excited to see that there was snow in the Myrtle Forest picnic area car park as we pulled in. This boded well. I looked forward to seeing the cascading creek with its banks decked in snow. It did not disappoint. I wondered about the creek crossings that lay ahead – how icy and slippery they might be – but left that as a problem for later.  As it turned out, they were manageable – just.

The second crossing – the easier of the two.

Just before the second crossing, we met a jolly trio of HWC members, whose footsteps in the snow we’d been following the whole time. Unfortunately they had turned around just after the creek, and were on their way back to the car. Somehow, in weather like that it’s nice to think of someone “up there” ahead of you; someone else wild enough to be on the mountain in snow with further storms forecast. Now the only footprints in the snow were those made by Paddymelons and wombats. I find it endearing that the animals of the forest choose to use the pathways created by humans for humans. They are smart enough to pick that these routes offer the least resistance to forwards movement. Once, after a snowstorm on Cradle, I was on the boardwalk following tiny footprints in the snow, and here I was doing it again. The path was not marked on the trees. I was deciding on its whereabouts by picking the clearest line through the vegetation – a method that became harder the higher we climbed, as vegetation thinned out.

There’s the best line. Straight through that puddle.

My husband got to follow my prints.

The beautiful rainforest, firstly characterised by ferns and later by small pandani plants with snowy caps on, eventually ceded to burnt out snow gums, especially once we’d crossed the fire trail. Climbing in some sections was very steep indeed. I guessed there were rocks under the snow, as otherwise I think we would have slipped downhill a bit. My foot found it easy to kick into or onto something horizontal despite the severe angle of the snow.

Clouds began encircling us; visibility lessened. Just as my husband’s “I think we should turn around” kind of noises increased, I gasped. Up ahead I could see that every single tree and bush had a glorious coating of ice. We were in fairy land. Sorry, but I was not turning around in the presence of beauty such as this. As long as it didn’t actually snow, I knew the way down would be much quicker than our ascent, not just because of not fighting gravity, but also because I was doing all the step kicking and all the route finding on the way up. As long as I could follow our own footsteps down, the task would be halved. On we marched.

 

Fagus adorned in white, sparkling jewellery.

Nearly there. B taking the lead so I could take a photo of his back as the ground levelled out for the summit.
As I suspected, the way down was almost lightning fast. Speeds in the snow on the way up had been extraordinarily slow, which is why the other group had turned back. You needed to be prepared to take twice the normal time to factor in for step kicking, general caution and deciding where the track might be once things got vague. I had fun in the snow. I would have liked to use my macro lens on some of the formations, but moving was a high priority in those conditions.

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Meander Falls 2015 Jul

Meander Falls, July 2015

There are some things that every genuine Taswegian has done – like seeing Cradle Mountain or going to the top of Mt Wellington, and I have always thought that seeing the Meander Falls was one of those things. It is thus with a very shamed face that I admit that I went to Meander Falls for the very first time today. I guess part of the trouble in recent years has been that the bridges normally crossed to get there came down in a flood several years ago and have not been replaced, making getting to the start much harder than doing the walk. Certainly, today, that was the only navigational challenge. Once you’ve reached the start box, it’s all easy. You just have to walk on a track for a bit and then you’re there.

The Meander River as you meander your way along it

Both my friend, Angela, and I had certainly been put off for a while by the absence of bridges, and by the fact that the map shows no connecting roads to the start any more. (She is a genuine Tassie girl, however, having been there as a teenager). Our interest in reaching the falls was rekindled recently when friends indicated there was now a way to drive there, so we decided today to give it a try. We made an error or two; I used the 4WD function on my car for the very first time; we skated through some mud when I would have liked a little traction, but we got there to the old carpark with great big signs welcoming us, and we were away.

And there are the falls, behind Angela.

Rain was forecast for the afternoon, so we didn’t waste much time climbing to the falls on the way out – along through pleasant rainforest with the gurgling Meander River beside us. I wanted to photograph it, but even more than that, I wanted to get to see the falls and get out again before the rains came – not only to beat getting cold and wet, but also because I was worried about the huge amount of mud we’d encountered on the way in. I didn’t want to be driving out with any more mud than I’d negotiated on the approach! The sign said it was a six hour return trip, and that sounded rather long with the weather changing. We were very happy to arrive at the falls after 1 hr 40. We were also excited, as the higher we climbed, the more snow we encountered. It was beautiful. And just as we arrived at the falls, large, slow flakes began descending upon us.

Angela kindly didn’t fuss while I wasted time setting up my tripod for she long exposure shots.

We photographed and ate a snack and then returned to the car with no other detours, anxious about what was happening to the mud. We didn’t eat the second half of our lunch until we were out the other side of it. The muddy bit is a new section of “road” which is not on the map, but which has been made, we suppose, to connect to bits of road that are on the map and that can then be used to reach the falls. This walk is on the list of Tasmania, Parks and Wildlife Service’s 60 Great Walks, suitable for families, so we both found it sad that the walk is there and not even overgrown despite its lack of use, but that access is so difficult. There are no signposts to tell you where you’re going. For instructions to the start, please see below.

The route walked. Waypoint is the carpark.
Altitude gained and lost.

10 kms. We took a total of 3 hrs 14 return (plus photos). Just short of 500 ms climb.

To get there:
First head for Meander. There, you will find a sign to the falls (and to the dam. Both use the same road for a while). It’s the only sign to the falls you’ll find. Keep heading for the dam, which is signed.

When you reach the intersection above, turn left. The old road curves right (but you’ll end up in the river if you use it). We had been told to turn left at a cardboard sign, so sailed right at this point, not knowing the sign was deceased, so had to return to this point. After that, take the next two turns to the right. Both are signposted to an Apex Hut.

This is the second such sign.
See that nice road to the left? That’s not yours. See the muck and …. to the right? Yes, that’s your route. Even using 4WD, we did some skating. I would NOT attempt this is a standard car.
This is the connecting road. It links you after maybe 600ms to a very nice dirt road that is easy driving. You follow it along until you get to an intersection, your last one, and here you turn left, noting that you have been on Spur 2. You might like to remember that for the return journey. Soon you’ll arrive at the carpark, and then the fun walk begins.
Here is what I’ve just described to you on a map. The map is confusing as your road (the red line) is not on a mapped road, and neither is the dam that you drove beside, but don’t let little things like that worry you. Just go with the flow and you’ll get to see the falls.