Mount Cleveland, Cape Cleveland, nr Townsville North Queensland

Character: A very rough walk, very rocky ground with dense undergrowth.

*Remember to take plenty of water and to tell someone of your plans!*

Ascent: ~1800 feet

Time: 3 hours

Accomodation: Townsville is roughly 30 minutes to the North on the Bruce Highway with plenty of accomodation

Map: Bowling Green Bay, Sheet 8359. 1:100 000

I have to start by admitting that I have not been to the summit of Mount Cleveland! This walk actually takes you up a subsidiary peak, at grid reference 167 862, roughly 1600 feet above sea level.

Start on the AIMS road, signposted off the Bruce Highway some 20 minutes South of Townsville. This road is followed almost to its end. Roughly 2 km before the end is a road marked Cocoa Creek, and another few hundred metres further on past this turn a small track starts on the left. Park here, and make you way through what looks like an overgrown shallow quarry. Then aim North West up the steepest ground. This is essentially the direction for the whole walk. Occassionally you may see small cairns. We did not leave these (!), but my guess is the Townsville Bushwalking Club did.

The views begin to open out back over the low flood plains to the South and South East, and also into the nice wooded valley to the East that separates this ridge from Mount Cleveland itself. Mount Cleveland's twin peaks are quite distinctive.

Higher up, the long grass and undergrowth are occassionally supplanted by forests of head high grass trees, or 'Black Boys' to use the older, non-PC term.

The ridge leading to the summit has many false peaks, which is somewhat disheartening! Nonetheless, the feeling of walking where so few others have done, and the views, make this effort worthwhile.

Now the ultimate embarassment. Not only is this walk not about summitting Mount Cleveland, but I must admit that we did not even summit this subsidiary peak! We got to a final false summit, with the real summit some 100 metres away as the crow flies and some 5 metres higher than we were, and though "Stuff it". Silly really, as we could see Magnetic Island poking out from behind this peak in front of us, and Townsville in the distance to the left of it, so the views from the top would have been stupendous.

I'll be back in the winter, to knock of Mt C itself!

The movie file below is in Quicktime format. You may need to download a helper or plugin from the Apple website.

The movie is in two parts. One day we scaled a small top at around 1200 feet at GR 164 832, and a week later did the walk described above. The first section of video, taken from the small top, shows the ridge followed the next week. The twin tops of this second walk mirror Mount Clevelands twin tops, but are some 200 feet lower. The second part of the movie shows the main South ridge of Mount Cleveland which would be the obvious route of ascent. Ross Hall is my handsome companion, seen briefly near the start of the movie! The music is from Steve Hackett and The Royal Philharmonic Orchaestra - hope they don't mind!