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DOC Land
Altitude: 1056m to 1456m. Gain: 763m. Loss: 519m . Gradient: 4 deg (Gentle)
Skills: Alpine weather (2/7) - Streams (2/6)
A long, uninteresting walk along a fenceline / 4WD track connects Two Thumb Stream to Rex Simpson Memorial Hut.
From the basin in Two Thumb Stream, 1.5km above the confluence with North East Gorge, climbs south up the obvious grassy spur leasing to the terraces above North East Gorge. Sidle south at about 1250m on good gentle tussock faces until you spot the fenceline rising to meet you.
Follow the boundary fence south (remaining on the uphill side). A few scrambles through side creeks are required, but otherwise going is easy if uninteresting. 4WD track starts at Second Waterfall Stream running parallel to the fenceline, and can be followed all the way to Mount Gerald Stream - though it crosses the fenceline into private land in places so return to following the fenceline where that happens. At Mount Gerald Stream the track and deer-fence cut west, downhill. Leave them here and follow an old tumble-down fence through Mt Gerald Stream, climbing some 100m once on the southern side to meet the end of another 4WD track on terraces above.
Rex Simpson Hut is 800m further south along this track. The hut is some 100m east of the track (uphill), is not signposted and and is easy to miss.