Rawson - Mushroom Rocks and Mt Erica Walk
The return walk to Mushroom Rocks, a maze of giant granite tors, is about 3 km from the Mt Erica Car Park. Continuing to Mount Erica is about 8km return.
The walk is located in the Baw Baw National Park about 14 km north of Rawson. The walking track weaves though huge Granite boulders of all shapes and sizes. The walk goes through tree ferns, silver wattles and higher up, snow gums.
The large tors at Mushroom Rocks are a very distinctive remnant of an ancient landscape from 360-370 million years ago. Unlike lava that erupts from volcanoes and cools on the earths surface (such as basalt), the rocks here formed as molten magma cooled deep within the earth's crust (granite and granodiorite).
The hard resistant granodiorite is eventually exposed as the surrounding softer rock is worn away, often along faults or lines of weakness running at right angles to one another, like a giant block of chocolate.
Directions: From Rawson, follow the road signs north toward the Thomson Dam. You will soon see a sign to the left to Mount Erica. Follow the unpaved, but well maintained Mount Erica Road to an intersection, where you turn right to reach the car park.
Review:
At the point where you turn right to the car park is another area with some tables and the 20 min return Mountain Monarchs Walk which looks a bit overgrown.
At the main car park are two unshaded tables, toilets and information board. There is a loop trail from the car park, Beech Gully Nature Trail which is 30 min return.
The main track leads from Car Park at 1090m to Mushroom Rocks at 1240m (3km return) and Mount Erica at 1512m (8 km return). The track is part of the Australian Alps Walking Track.
The track was a bit muddy in early April and there are some sections of boardwalk in the lower section which has a lot of tree ferns in a mountain forest. The track is narrow in sections and vegetation encroaches right up to the path including a number of trees laying across the path. There is a gradual increase in elevation over the whole walk, although it flattens out in the area where most of the rocks are located. You need to do a little bit of bush-bashing to find the best example of a mushroom room but there are plenty of opportunities to do some rock scrambling.
The area is a fuel stove area and campfires are not permitted.
We took about three hours to do the return walk to Mushroom Rocks which included time scrambling around the rocks.
Photos:
Location
Mt Erica Road, Baw Baw 3833 Map
Web Links
→ Mushroom Rocks Walk Map (PDF)
→ Mushroom Rocks - Baw Baw National Park - Rawson - Victoria (Bushwalking Blog)
→ Mt Baw Baw Park Notes (PDF)
