Rachmartee

I’ve always been curious about doing Fortress Canyon, I didn’t know much about it, but always heard about it through the canyon community.

So one weekend Ethan and I thought heck, why not, let’s go check it out! It does after all, end at the huge Fortress Creek Falls that tumbles down into the Grose Valley.

We must have turned off the tourist track a bit too early, as we found ourselves navigating our way through a very unpleasant swamp.

Finally reaching the creek, it wasn’t all that much better.

It was a pretty enough creek, but majority of the canyon just felt like an open creek walk. I am sure we added on more creek than necessary with our early entry.

Still pretty though!

We finally reached the canyon section! Which has one small abseil and was unfortunately very short.

Not long after the abseil the canyon opens up and we found ourselves rock hopping a short distance to the top of Fortress Creek Falls.

Unfortunately Fortress Creek Falls has somewhat gone viral in the last few years, so we bumped into a lot of day hikers at the end of the canyon which burst the ‘being out in wild nature’ bubble.

We even passed one couple before the falls, who were heading upstream in the wrong direction, and asked us where the main falls was. Quite puzzled, we pointed downstream towards the huge cliff edge which was the only viable location for the falls to be… it never ceases to amaze me how incapable some people are in navigating the outdoors…

Once on top of Fortress Ridge, the burst bubble from the masses of day hikers soon inflated again, as we were treated with some of the most beautiful views in the Blue Mountains. The kind of views that really ease your heart, fill your lungs with crisp fresh mountain air and fills your cup.

A pretty glorious walk back to the car.

Would I do a trip through Fortress Canyon again? Honestly, probably not. But I would certainly re-visit this ridge walk again.