We started out early from the Red Hills Hut this morning in an effort to hit town as early as possible and maximize relaxation time. We figured it’d be about 3 hours to the road and another 2 hours on the road into town. Unfortunately the clouds had settled in and we weren’t going to get much of a view from any of our high points. We hit 3 small summits before making it to the 4WD track and each was just as cloudy as the next. The track itself was mostly through bush but very enjoyable and fast.

Once we hit the 4WD track we started to descend and could finally see below the cloud and into the valley.

We ate our last snack bars at the end of the 4WD track and were officially out of food. Knowing we were now out of food of course made us hungry so we practically sprinted the last 8km into St. Arnaud.

We checked into our hostel and before even showering headed over to the cafe for a large lunch. After about five minutes enjoying the cafe we decided we’d zero tomorrow here as well so we slowed down a bit and began to relax. For dinner we’ve headed to the famous Sunday BBQ buffet and the Alpine Lodge. It ended up being a complete coincidence that we arrived on a Sunday but the timing obviously couldn’t have been better. We both went through many plates at the buffet (they gave Heather a discounted salad only buffet which she made good use of). Apparently they’re quite happy to have TA trampers come through and we seemed to be somewhat of a novelty to the old people staying at the lodge.

We’ve met a number of other NoBo’s here at the hostel and will spend tomorrow hanging out and chatting with them and figuring out what’s next for us on the trail.