Lone Tree - training for Mt Wilhelm

Last Saturday a bunch of us went on a little hike up to the top of Lone Tree, the top of one of the ridges around the valley that Ukarumpa is nestled in. Lone Tree is a rather poor name for the hill that we were going up, as at the top of the hill is a forest, apparently it was named before the landowners planted the forest and I guess no-one has bothered to update the name yet.


The best time for hiking around these parts seems to be in the morning, as it usually starts raining in the afternoon. That fact in mind, it was decided that we would meet at 9 in the morning, a time of day I rarely see during the weekend. Still I managed to drag myself out of bed in time and even managed a spot of breakfast before heading off. It was a stunner of a day, nice and sunny but not too hot, perfect conditions really.


Just outside the gates of Ukarumpa we came across a river that we had to cross, so we all waded across, some finding better paths than others. Not far after the river we walked through a village, then through some gardens. Around about then some children from the village decided that we didn't know the way, so they became our guides, leading us all the way to the top and back down safely. Dan rewarded them with a bag of corn chips for their hard work.

All up the hike took around 4 hours going at a somewhat leisurely pace. A grand time was had by all, as far as I could tell.

For some of us there was a secondary reason for doing this hike (although I would have still gone anyway). Next weekend 6 of us are going to climb the highest peak in PNG, Mt Wilhelm. At a height of 4,509 metres it is around 1,000 metres higher than Mt Cook, New Zealand's highest mountain, so the altitude will certainly be making the hike somewhat more difficult than lone tree was. We leave Friday morning and drive for 5 or so hours before starting a 4 hour hike to a lake and a cabin where we can have a spot of dinner before trying to get a couple of hours sleep. Then at 1am we have to get up again and start the climb to the summit in order to arrive at around sunrise. Leaving it much later is not such a good idea as the mountain usually is clouded over an hour after sunrise, and we would really like to see the view from the top. Then we will descend back down to the cabin where we will spend the afternoon and night before going the back to the vehicle the next morning. Hopefully that will give us time to go to "The Bird" in Goroka for dinner on the way home. It should be a blast, the others I am going with are really fun people. I'll keep y'all posted on how the trip goes next week.