FKT: Megan Sleswick, Danny Sleswick - Cooloola Great Walk (QL, Australia) - 2022-12-11

To commemorate the end of my 40’s by exploring new activities, Megan and I hiked the Cooloola Great Walk from Rainbow Beach to Noosa. We were fastpacking meaning we had a tent and sleeping gear to spend the night on the trails (getting away from our teenage boys) but far less weight and comfort than traditional hiking. Megan and I decided to follow Nathan’s exact trail and set an FKT for a mixed team and as there was no recorded mixed team time and this could be a bit of a warmup to see if we want to take on some more serious FKT attempts. We were relaxed about taking two days to complete the 88.7km trail. So relaxed (and busy with work and Christmas catchups) that it wasn’t until packing our gear on the Friday night we realised it was going to take us 4 hours to drive to the starting point the next morning. We drove to the in-laws, dropped a car at Tewantin and headed to Rainbow beach to get started. The late start meant we were already in the heat of the day and after finding the correct starting point, I was instantly frustrated by waiting for my Garmin watch to find a satellite signal. I spend time in nature to get away from technology and have never owned a smart watch but recording the FKT meant recording the hike on a GPS watch as well as on my phones Strava and being an overnight hike meant taking spare batteries and charging cords for them so that they could track us continually from the start to the finish. It is only 2.8km into the walk before we came to the Carlo Sandblow and after we passed that point, we stopped seeing many walkers and started to get into the rhythm of the hike. Kauri walkers' camp is 18km into the hike and the first opportunity to get drinking water. Every walkers’ camp has raised platforms with lock boxes to store your food away from animals, a toilet and water tanks that all had good water. We would stop at each camp to eat and top up our water which we filtered before putting into our bottles. It was another 20km to the Litoria walkers' camp and dark by the time we got there. This was the only time we saw anyone set up at a camp site and after we had dinner, we set off again to hike to the next site. I enjoyed hiking in the dark, it was cooler and added a different element to the hike. We reached Dutgee walkers' camp around midnight and 60km into the hike and we set up our tent for some sleep. With an overnight low of 22 degrees, we had thermal tops to sleep in and had not taken our sleeping quilt. This was the only piece of our equipment that we didn’t get right, and we had to use an emergency blanket to keep warm. The second morning took us to the Cooloola Sandpatch which is a highlight of the walk, but a reminder that it was a very hot time of the year to be fastpacking in Qld. The trails are more open in the southern end of the trail which means some great views but lots of sun and soft sand on the trail. By the time we got to Brahminy walkers' camp I was hot, dehydrated and tired, we weren’t going to make it to the Christmas party we were meant to go to, and I was frustrated that we hadn’t planned better. Torn between wanting to push on to be finished, but also take time to rest, swim and enjoy the hike we tried to do both. I did jump in the ocean for a little while to cool down, but the last section of Nathan’s track we were following stayed on the road instead of the trail, then there wasn’t a pub at the finish that I had remembered from many years ago. Even after reaching the finish there was still no drinking water and we still had a few km left to get to our car. But in the end, we got it done and know with some better planning we can take on some more long hikes and try and set some more FKT’s.