{{Use Australian English, date=August 2013 Bruce's Walk is a bush track in the Blue Mountains area of

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

, Australia. It is located approximately 100 kilometres west of

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Description and history

Bruce's Walk originally began as a maintenance track in 1931. The Railway Department had agreed to supply electricity to the Blue Mountains Shire Council from the power station at Lithgow and a transmission line was put through from Blackheath to Lawson, with a track to provide maintenance access. The line went south from Blackheath, passed a little west of the Grand Canyon, through the bush east of

Medlow Bath Medlow Bath (postcode: 2780) is a village located near the highest point of the Blue Mountains, New South Wales, Australia. Located between and , its altitude is about . It is about west-north-west of the Sydney central business district and ...

, across the ridges north of

Katoomba Katoomba is the main town and council seat of the City of Blue Mountains in New South Wales, Australia, and is the administrative centre of Blue Mountains City Council. Situated on the Great Western Highway and the Great Western Railway, Kato ...

Leura Leura (postcode: 2780) is a suburb in the City of Blue Mountains local government area that is located west of the Sydney central business district in New South Wales, Australia. It is one of the series of small towns stretched along the Main W ...

and

Wentworth Falls Wentworth Falls (Postcodes in Australia, postcode: 2782) is a town in the Blue Mountains (New South Wales), Blue Mountains region of New South Wales, situated approximately west of the Sydney central business district, and about east of Katoo ...

, across the gullies on the fringes of Bullaburra and into Lawson. The authorities then decided to promote the maintenance track as a walking trail, which was duly opened on 21 November 1931. The surveyor who planned the track was A.Bruce, as a result of which the track eventually became known as Bruce's Walk. A pamphlet was published to publicise the walk, which passed through a variety of scenery, including glens and ridges. However, from World War II onwards, the track was forgotten and neglected. Parts of the track were also blocked off when the council constructed Lake Greaves in 1942 as a local water supply. Much later, however, a local walker named Dick Rushton found a copy of the pamphlet published in 1931 and set out to clear and mark the track. In 1980 he led a party of walkers along the section of track between Bullaburra and Wentworth Falls, and in 1983 he created a written guide to the track. By 1986, Bruce's Walk had come to the attention of two other walkers, Jim Smith and Wilf Hilder, who organised a group of volunteers to clear the track between Bullaburra and Wentworth Falls. In the process, they found many artefacts and features, including signs, shelter caves, seats and picnic tables. This part of the track was officially opened on 24 May 1986, by Alderman David Lawton. The opening was attended by 118 people, including Dick Rushton, who was by then eighty years old. (This opening was condemned by the National Parks and Wildlife Service and the Mayor of the

Blue Mountains City Council The City of Blue Mountains is a local government area of New South Wales, Australia, governed by the Blue Mountains City Council. The city is located in the Blue Mountains, on the Great Dividing Range at the far western fringe of the Greater ...

.) Other stretches of the track, from Wentworth Falls to Medlow Bath, were also cleared by the volunteers and opened later in 1986. The track, however, is still patchy and largely without signposts, and is not shown on the topographic map for the area.Katoomba Topographic Map 8930-I-S, Department of Lands, New South Wales

Description and history

See also

References