While on a whitewater rafting trip to find out the truth about an ...

WhiteWATER R AF TING
38
<strong>While</strong> on a whitewater rafting trip to
find out the truth about an enigmatic
local legend, Andrew Harris unlocks the
secret of Murray Gates Gorge’s
enduring appeal
photography PHOTOLIBRARY
tiger tales jul-aug

‘I haven’t
seen it like
this for a
long time…’
It’s dusk at Tom Groggin Station on
the slopes of the Snowy Mountains and
river guide Linton Smith falls quiet as he
scans a raging stretch of the Murray River.
We’ve been planning to hit it in inflatable
kayaks, but with the catchment at Thredbo
and Falls Creek swollen from an ongoing
downpour that began the previous night,
it’s 14ft raft time.
Expat Canadian river guide Caleb “The
Real Bear Grylls” Feasby and apprentice
Steve “Don’t Call Me ‘Grasshopper’”
Eeles join us on our adventure. Caleb, who
famously completed a first descent of the
Moran and Mitchell Rivers in the Kimberley
in 19 days, has been down this gorge
before. For Steve and me, it’s the first time.
Less than a week from the winter
solstice, ground support is impossible.
Access roads are closed and anyone with
any sense is hibernating. It’s time to pack
the dry bags for the first Murray Gates
40 41
less than a week from the winter solstice, ground
support is impossible. Access roads are closed and
anyone with any sense is hibernating. time to pack the
dry bags for the season’s first murray gates gorge run
Caleb and Steve inflate the raft
at Tom Groggin Station
Gorge run of the season. There’s a second
reason we’re paddling – we’re following the
trail of a legendary modern-day hermit, the
late Frank “Pop” Thomson.
<strong>While</strong> rafting the Mitta Mitta River with
Linton previously, we had talked about who
lived out in the wilderness of north-east
Victoria. He mentioned a hermit who had
frequented an area along the Murray River
near the Murray Gates. Linton had heard
stories in and around the small town of
Corryong about an unkempt old man
surfacing for supplies, piquing everyone’s
curiosity, scaring the kids and then
vanishing again back to the bush. Linton
reckoned if we ever did the gates, the
river’s turbulent birthplace, the hermit’s
story might be worth investigating.
It’s earlier in the day and we’re in
Corryong – population 1,500, 450km
north-east of Melbourne – for supplies.
Standing out front of his sports storecum-barber
shop – a half century-old
local institution – 80-year-old Ron “Hobie”
Hoban remembers Pop Thomson fondly.
“I used to cut his hair… he was a bloody
good old fella,” he tells me, admitting that
it might have been 50 years since he last
saw Pop. “We all liked him,” he adds, then
turns his eyes east to the storm rolling into
town along the Murray Valley Highway. The
Unloading the raft
on the riverbank
Trevor Davis, station
manager of Tom
Groggin Station
Linton surveys the
river ahead
WHITEWATER R AF TING
Ready to roll at Tom
Groggin Station
Ron
“Hobie”
Hoban
photography Andrew Harris
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WHITEWATER R AF TING
rain comes, turns horizontal and drives
Ron inside. A neighbouring shop owner
points at our trailer of inflatable kayaks and
shouts, “You might be needing those soon.”
That evening at Tom Groggin Station,
we’re out in a hut that once sheltered
Jack Riley, believed by some to be bush
poet Banjo Paterson’s “Man From Snowy
River”. Nobody knows if the legendary
outdoorsman was actually a composite of
many local cattleman. It’s possible that our
hermit, Pop, is remembered similarly; the
lines between him and other bush-dwelling
loners have been blurred.
The next morning, station manager
Trevor Davis, who grew up in the area, tells
me what he knows about Pop. “I think he
was in World War II, and after that he came
back to the city but couldn’t cope with city
life. I don’t know how he got that bit of land
up in Bunroy. He built a humpy and it just
grew from there. He was a bit of a weird old
And then there’s the first-run factor.
Linton explains that there could be all sorts
of “new wood” such as fallen trees in the
river, and other debris like clotheslines that
could trap rafters and toss them overboard
into the freezing water.
At low-water levels, the Murray Gates
demands a frustrating degree of technical
know-how. At near-flood levels, it’s one
long, fierce stretch. And at its current level
of 1.2m – far too much water for kayaks –
it’s fit only for our much larger raft.
Once we’re afloat, chatter drops to a
minimum. An icy breeze blows upriver,
numbing us silent. We’re listening for the
first rush of the rapids. Guiding from the
rear, Linton instructs us clearly: “Look
out for new wood”. The river will usually
flow over or around rocks, but when a tree
splashes into the water, it creates “sieves”
or “strainers” that can puncture or trap
rafts and suck people under. In lower water,
Linton would have brought a chainsaw
along for the ride.
The rain comes and
Then, the roar begins. “Head breaker”,
quickly turns horizontal.
it’s called. Linton screams over the din
a shop owner points
of rushing water, “Get ready to forward
42 at our trailer of
paddle! Forward paddle! Go hard!” Then,
it’s “Stop! Stop!” followed by a frantic
43
inflatable kayaks and
“Back paddle!” And so it goes. Soon, at
shouts, ‘you might be
“Off the Wall” – one of the river’s
needing those soon’
colourfully named rapids – we graze a rock
guy. He had a couple of little dogs. He did
a little bit of gold prospecting up there –
he actually taught us how to prospect for
gold.” Trevor says Pop showed him how
to dig with a teaspoon into certain rock
crevices for flecks and tiny nuggets. Pop
had a couple of jars of gold, he reckons. The
old man went into town every Saturday,
Trevor says, and one afternoon he returned
to find his stash had been stolen. “Not long
after that, he fell to pieces.”
The Murray Gates Gorge is first-class
whitewater. Located more than 510km from
Melbourne, it’s vehicle-accessible only
in summer. Linton won’t grade individual
rapids for me – 20 are significant enough to
have earned names – but he does concede
that it’s a very technical, grade-four river.
On the six-grade International Scale of
River Difficulty, that makes it suitable
only for expert boatmen. The Murray is so
narrow that there’s only one right line or
route through each rapid. “If you do make a
mistake,” Linton says, “you’re in the poo.”
Linton Smith Steve Eeles Caleb Feasby
photography Andrew Harris
Steve and Caleb
negotiate a rapid
Linton, Caleb and
Steve in a tight spot
wall before manoeuvring past.
Linton’s approach is elegant – minimal
effort with maximal output. He heads
towards obstacles and then makes small
adjustments to pass them. Better this than
going out of his way to avoid things and
having to over-correct in a big way.
Still, at “Shark’s Tooth” he deems
passage unsafe so we undertake a heavy
portage over a fallen tree. So well-chosen
are Linton’s lines that there are remarkably
few “overs”, where a crew must leap “over
left” or “over right” to instantaneously
counterbalance a flipping raft. At “The
Thing”, a nasty bit of rock nearly flips us,
but Caleb shunts himself across the raft
to stabilise us. Later, he gives an encore
performance at “Hole in the Head”.
“The Rock Garden” is a lengthy, fast,
pinball-like ride with a “flip-rock” at the
bottom, which we avoid. We’re all buzzing,
working like the well-oiled machine a
rafting crew needs to be.
The last significant rapid is “Jellyfish
Rock”, so named because people try to go
left instead of right and end up with their
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WHITEWATER R AF TING
Caleb tests out an
abandoned boat
Linton and Caleb
portage past a narrow
section of the river
the last rapid is ‘jellyfish
rock’, so named because
people try to go left
instead of right and end
up pinned against a rock
45
photography Andrew Harris
What to bring:
Gear hung up
to dry at camp
If it’s too cold to get wet, only a
drysuit will keep you happy. The NRS
Extreme Relief Drysuit is durable,
waterproof, breathable and with
its built-in latex booties, qualifies
as a paddler’s best friend in winter.
Wear a thick pair of Merino socks
inside the booties, a pair of NRS
HydroSkin socks on the outside, and
stuff the works into a pair of tacky,
hard-wearing NRS Attack Shoes. As
for your hands, wear a pair of NRS
Maverick Gloves, made of heavy-duty
neoprene, featuring a grippy textured
palm and insulated with flecks of
heat-reflecting titanium. For more
information, visit www.nrsweb.com.
boat pinned against a rock. We avoid that
fate and then nearly end up missing our
destination, Surveyor’s Camp. The old
piece of canoe that was supposed to have
been nailed to a tree to mark the way is
missing. With daylight fading fast, we catch
sight of the track leading to the camp in the
nick of time.
The rain eases up long enough for us to
cook, eat and thaw by the campfire. Then it
settles in for the night. Greedily lapping up
the deluge, the river rushes by below and I
drift into whitewater dreams.
The next day, we paddle on to Pop’s old
stomping ground. Long, loose unnamed
rapids alternate with flat stretches where
we spy platypus feeding on goodies
brought by the rains. Huge brown birds
swoop down from nearby cliffs and fly
ahead of us. The water is so pristine that we
drink straight from the river. All the while, a
Linton demonstrates
what to do when a
rafter goes overboard
fine rain sprays down. Soon we’re paddling
down to a bend in the river where we were
told that Pop once panned for gold. It’s
called “Little Niche” these days but it’s still
known locally as “Pop’s Farm”.
After leaving the raft, labouring up a
steep cutting, then descending into a tiny,
sheltered valley, we find two generations of
Pop’s descendents awaiting us with tea and
biscuits in a fire-warmed outbuilding.
Free of our drysuits, we sit down with
Ian “Thommo” Thompson, Ian’s daughter
Julie Martin and daughter-in-law Diane
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WHITEWATER R AF TING
Ian “Thommo” Thompson,
the hermit’s son
“Pop” Thompson, the
hermit himself
Ian Thompson displays
photos of his father
Pop Thompson’s
old paddlewheel
generator
Pop’s shack, left, with
modern addition
46
Thompson. It turns out that Ian’s dad, Pop,
moved down to this patch of bush in the
early ’70s. That’s when the story began.
Access then was extremely difficult.
Getting here required a trip down a rough
logging road followed by a lengthy hike.
It’s 44km from Corryong and you won’t
find it on Google Maps. Pop set up a simple
shelter and negotiated with the landowner
How to do it:
Linton Smith’s Rafting
Australia offers guided trips
through the Murray Gates. The
company can sort out your entire
adventure, including transport from
Melbourne and accommodation near
or on the river, but you’ll need to do
a less-intense paddle or two with
Rafting Australia first. tel: (0)2 6077
1164, www.raftingaustralia.com
to buy a few hectares, including a creek.
To supply needed power, he arranged for
a micro-scale hydro-electricity plant to be
built from a paddle wheel and bits of an old
washing machine. It was wired to an array
of lead-acid batteries.
Ian doesn’t know what year he was
born, but he reckons he’s about 75. Pop
died in 2000 when he was in his early 90s.
“Still a grumpy old bastard,” Julie says.
The property was passed down to Ian
and it’s now an extended-family holiday
spot. There’s Pop Thomson memorabilia
throughout the three-room hut, but no one
lives here permanently anymore.
Ian says his dad was a champion
rifleman but he never went to war and was
never even called up. He worked on the
railroads, where his labours and those of
others like him were vital to the war effort.
“Pop was basically a hermit,” Diane says.
“He had a couple of Shetland ponies, dogs
and he just loved living here on his own.
He knew how to ‘tickle’ the fish. In the dark
areas, you creep up, reach under and tickle
them and you’re able to pick them up.”
It’s not entirely clear why Pop became
a hermit. If the family knows the reason,
they’re not saying. They do tell me that
his marriage broke up and that he came
here to escape. Julie says it was “To repent
his sins.” Whatever Pop’s reasons, by the
time he had embroidered himself into the
fabric of local lore, he had already become
well plugged in to the untamed wilderness
here. It’s much the same for anyone who
likes to get out into the bush – including us.
We’re just four happy paddlers who made it
through the first run of the season, leaving
the Murray Gates swinging on their hinges.
Tiger Airways has multiple daily
flights to and from Melbourne.
Book flights at www.tigerairways.
com
photography Andrew Harris
tiger tales jul-aug