Moonlight Hike Smugglers Ridge Marramarra National Park - Saturday 17 August 2019

I have done a lot of hiking with the ANB group (all day time of course) but this moonlight hike at Smugglers Ridge was just incredible!  A big thank you to Liam our trusted guide who led us on this most amazing hike.  After a very very bumpy ride to the start of the walk we all donned our head lamps (protocol was not to turn your head directly at the person next to you for obvious reasons) but alas I couldn't quite get the hang of it and needless to say I blinded a few of my fellow walkers! So off we went into the darkness with the full moon following us - the first fire trail was an easy walk then it got narrower as we started our descent down the mountain to the river.  Once safely down we found our fire pit and made ourselves comfortable in the front of our roaring fire where we feasted on rocky road, smores and every variety of chocolate you could imagine!  Not to mention the wine, cheese and biscuits!  Very civilised indeed.  After our midnight snack we then headed to the creek where we were welcomed with a high tide (due to the full moon of course) - so after blankly staring at each other wondering what the hell we were going to do albeit not wanting to get ourselves wet (it was around 11pm at this time) our trusted guide Liam and partner in crime Rex decided to take themselves off into the darkness to try and find a dry passage across the river. They were successful in finding a large tree laying across the creek upstream - so the deal was you got on your hands and knees and crawled across the tree to the other side. Now there was good and bad in this idea as Sarah and I watched (or didn't watch) Rex crawling his way across the tree to the other side.  After more blank stares between Sarah and myself we decided rather than risk the tree crawl and fall in and get very very wet we would go back and wade through the creek and just get wet up to our knees! Karen, on the other hand, did a fantastic job of just walking on the tree to get herself to the other side!  Glad to report that Sarah and myself made it through the creek to other side with just wet feet and wet boots!  The next part of the hike was up, up and up!  And what a climb it was but we all made it to the top and a big thank you to Rex for some great conversation along the way as we made our climb up to the top. The brave souls who took on this challenge with Liam was Leah, Sarah, Rex and Karen.  It was a lot of fun and can't wait to do the next one!