Was there a late Saturday night movie on TV or were people avoiding Castle Hill Basin for fear of getting cooked after the spell of hot weather we’d had? Only three people turned up for this river and cave trip. We parked at the Cave Stream Reserve and set off at 0930 for nearby Broken River, crossing it 200m upstream of the Cave Stream cave exit.

Bruce led us up through limestone blocks to 793m Gorge Hill then along and down, heading towards Castle Hill Village so we could reach a major limestone overhang in the Thomas River, close to the Porter River junction. We met two fly fishermen as we crossed the Porter then met them later and they said they saw 14 trout, caught 4 and released 4. On the east side of Gorge Hill we got into Broken River and made many crossings in this briskly flowing river as we headed to the starting point of our Cave Stream walk. A young Japanese couple had head torches on, preparing to walk the cave. They saw the water depth and quickly asked Helen to store their phones in her backpack. The young woman was not tall and looked a bit panicked as water got near to shoulder height. We settled to a steady pace in water mostly less than knee-high and not too cold and emerged to a warm, bright sunshine, gave back the phone and returned to the car to change.