Looming above Arkaroola Village in the northern Flinders Ranges is Griselda Hill, named after Griselda Sprigg – the wife of Reg Sprigg, who purchased Arkaroola in 1968. While Griselda Hill is only about 460m in height, it’s 140m higher than the village below, so it offers some great views. (This is the shortest of six bushwalks over our one-week Flinders Ranges road trip.)
The signposted trail starts on Arkaroola Road just below the village; despite the sign, I miss the start of the trail and just head directly up the ridge-line from the road. (You could ignore the trail and make a bee-line to the top, but this would be a fair bit slower.)
My route up the ridge soon converges with the trail, which zig-zags up the steep slope. (The trail is not shown correctly on some maps – it does a number of zig and zags before heading diagonally up the slope to the western end of the summit ridge.)
The trail seems to stop just below the top of Griselda Hill, but if you continue to the bottom of the rocky summit on the western side there are some arrows on the rocks pointing out a route up, over and through the large boulders. Or you can scramble up the rocks on the northern side of the hill – I meet Kristina on the summit, who’s taken this alternative approach.
The Griselda Hill “summit” is more of a long, thin and rocky ridge, which is fairly barren except for some low shrubs and picturesque grass trees.
A summit cairn has been constructed at the eastern end of Griselda Hill, although there’s not really much difference in the height here compared to the western end. The elevation of Griselda Hill is about 470m – I haven’t found an official height for the summit, and I’ve seen it documented as 448m and 450m, which is too low based on the topographic map and my GPS data (I measured the height as 477m, which is pretty consistent with the topo map.)
Looking back along the Griselda Hill to the west you can see the narrow ridge, and the mountains of the Vulkathunha-Gammon Ranges National Park.
The benefit of continuing along the ridge is an expansive view to the east and south-east, over the Vulkathunha-Gammon Ranges National Park and towards Mount Warren Hastings.
To the north is one of Arkaroola’s three fully equipped astronomical observatories: the Sir Mark Oliphant Observatory, opened in 2003, has a 3.5m diameter fibreglass observatory dome with a computer-assisted 14-inch (360mm) Celestron SC telescope. Behind the observatory to the north-east is Mount Elva (616m), the large, rounded peak. Arkaroola Road is going along a section of valley known as Devils Pass.
Below Mount Griselda to the west is Arkaroola Village.
I gradually make my way back along the ridge to the western end of Griselda Hil, to catch the sun setting over the mountains behind Arkaroola Vilage.
It’s a great spot to watch the sun setting, with stunning views in every direction.
Once the sun has dropped below the horizon, I make my way back down the steep & rocky ridge – even with a head-torch, I wouldn’t want to be scrambling down in the dark.
It’s a quick 20min descent back to Arkaroola Road once I’ve negotiated the descent off the rocky peak; on the way down I encounter a couple of people who have been photographing the Yellow Footed Rock Wallabies that frequent Griselda Hill.
Getting to Griselda Hill
This is one of the easiest bushwalks to get to if you’re staying at Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary… walk down the main road (Arkaroola Road) from reception. Look for the signposted trailhead on the right about 100m after the mining museum. Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary is about 155km (2:30min) from Blinman in the northern section of the Flinders Ranges.
More information
- Arkaroola Wilderness Sanctuary – Griselda Sprigg
0 Comments