This website grew out of a desire to publish Keith Lancaster's work. A start was made in 1996 when I began to scan in some stories and transcribe them using OCR to Word format and from there into html format. In early 2000 the website itself was started and it has undergone slow growth ever since. Basically, I add bits when I can find the time. Now in February 2005 I feel the need for keeping a record of updates as they happen. This is because I very quickly forget what I put on and when and in what order.

Let's see how long this will last, and how accurate it will be.

2 March 2009
After almost a year it is time to addsome more stories and make a genuine attempt to finish this. If only there weren't so many distractions...
Added story 11: We Scale Ragged Mountain
Added story 12: Quamby Bluff has no terrors
Added story 13: The inhospitable Stack's Bluff

14 May 2008
Added story 156: Walls of Jerusalem via Mersey Road
Added story 158: Traversing the Loddons
Added story 167: Mt Mayday and Stormont
Previously added on 16 Feb 2008, story 69: Coal Hill, Gould's Sugar Loaf, and Pyramid Hill

3 October 2007
Added story 107: Mt Weld scrub bash
Added story 112: Tasmans Peninsula
Added story 113: Nicholls Cap
Added story 114: Freycinet Peninsula
Added story 115: Mt Cameron East
Added story 116: Across the Mueller Range

06 August 2007
Added story 109: To Sprent and Wedge
Added story 111: Mts La Perouse and Hippopotamus
Added story 155: The Highland Lakes

24 May 2007
Added story 110: Mt Albert
Added story 169: Christmas 1963 in the South West
Linked two places in the text with earlier stories: a reference to trip 157 Frankland and Arthurs, and a reference to climbing Federation Peak.

27 April 2007
Added picture of Mt Rogoona sent to me by an old schoolmate, John Evans of Canberra. I have also added a link to his website which has some really fine Tasmanian bushwalking stories in it. This has replaced Luuk's website, as that seems to be off the air for some forseeable time.

20 April 2007
Added story 89: In the Heart of the South Western Mountains. This story is quite an epic with 12 peaks bagged! There is a nice story about some tiger snakes in it: Approaching the entrance to Jones Pass, we had a lively tussle with an aggressive tiger snake which fell a victim to the axe. Deciding to take him along to replenish our diminishing food stocks, we encountered yet another tiger snake just inside the pass and he met his end by rock assault. The two 4’6” tigers (Notechis scutatus) were then skun and we went on with high hopes of a sumptuous repast. And later: When we tackled the snake meat in the morning, we found the flesh not so attractive, but the least satisfactory feature was that there was so little meat on the boney frames that one would want half a dozen large snakes for a decent meal. A delightful tale of political incorrectness, by today's standards!

2 April 2007
Added story 140: Mt Rogoona or bust!

6 January 2007
Added story 159: Mt. Young

26 December 2006
Updated the Diary Index page and the Pages on the Website page. Both of these had not been updated for a while. The Diary Index now shows 168000 words approx. have been added to the website. The other page shows that this represents 44.5% of Keith's diary. I notice that Mozilla Firefox still shows the hidden columns in the latter page (which has been saved in Excel as an htm file), while IE7 shows the page correctly. Time to upgrade to Firefox 2.0...... Done, but the result is the same.

20 December 2006
Added story 68: Molly York's Nightcap
Added story 10: The Majestic Grandeur of Devil's Gullet
Added story 163: The Ben Lomond Traverse
Added story 164: To Back Peak and Mt. Bell
Added story 165: The Asbestos Range
Added story 217: The Dial Range Again

11 December 2006
Added story 67: A mid-winter jaunt to Billop Bluff
This is the first of a new set of stories to be put on the site. I am attempting to lift the rate of adding stories so that it is not going to take forever to complete. There are other things I want to do with this website, such as indexing and cross-referencing, let alone the redesign my offspring urge me to do.. But first, those stories.... I am going to concentrate on the '50s and '60s, as these are of more potential relevance to a dwindling number of people who actually walked with Keith.

2 December 2006
Added story 97: Back to the Walls of Jerusalem
Added story 98: Ridge-traversing the Southern Mountains

21 August 2006
Changed Hobart Walking Club link to their new site at:
http://www.hobartwalkingclub.org.au/
at the request of Midj Jones.

9 August 2006
Added story 106 Christmas at the Franklands
This is a typical Keith story: he could not get anybody to walk with him, so he went alone. A large part of this trip was spent traversing the floor of the new "Lake Pedder". Still to investigate: Keith's naming of several mountains in the Frankland Range.

17 July 2006
Added story 102 Gordon Vale again
Added story 103 Thetis in the rain
Added story 104 St. Patrick's Head
Added story 105 Mts. Vandyke and Claude
Updated the updates
The pace has picked up a little as a result of "batching" the stories into consecutive sets. I think it is time to chase down those elusive photographs, and add a bit of variety to the site.

11 July 2006
Added story 100 The Dial Range
Added story 101 Mt Sedgwick and the Tyndall Range

3 July 2006
Added story 7 We capture Mt Arthur with ease
Added story 8 Difficulties in capturing Brady's lookout
Added story 9 Via the Mole Creek - Lorinna track to Mt Roland solo
Updated the index and the updates
This site is showing a slow but steady growth in visits. There has been more positive reaction. Nevertheless there has also been a bit of a hiatus in growth to the site. Time to rustle up some more pictures and put in some of the interesting 50s and 60s walks.

12 April 2006
Added story 72 A vain attempt at Federation
Corrected the href to the Gordon Bend picture

29 March 2006
Added story 6 We capture Mt. Barrow with ease
Added a new black-and-white photo of Lake Pedder, taken from the Franklands, possibly in the 1940's.
Added another photo to the story of the Hermit at Gordon Vale, showing the bridge and hut at Gordon Bend in 1947. The picture quality is not great - historic value only...

22 February 2006
Added story 204 Rebuffed on the Fields
There were press releases on the Maydena Hauler which will be constructed during 2006. So I checked Keith's peak list and found Abbotts Lookout in this story. I found that Keith had driven to the top of Roberts Road and ended up at the TV relay towers in heavy mist, thinking he was on the top of Abbotts Lookout. He missed the real crest by 660 metres and 53 metres vertical. Had he ever known this, he would not have been happy given the singlemindedness with which he always sought out the absolute tops. However, he was 82, an age at which the challenge of driving a Volkswagen Kombi up a 4-wheel drive access road to a mountaintop would have daunted most.

And having done that, he went on to climb Mt Mawson in the face of the kind of Tasmanian weather which regularly gets bushwalkers even a quarter of his age into trouble. I love his justification: "It was not a pleasant decision to envisage a walk up Mt. Mawson in what daylight was still available, but there was much to be learned by tackling it".

15 February 2006
Added story 81 Rock Problems of Cyrian [Geryon]
Kept the "original spelling rule" which I also applied in the Clumner Bluff story. On the whole I have kept fairly close to Keith's spelling, correcting only obvious typos, and standardising his distance and height notations. It is appropriate to show the Cyrian spelling for Geryon, allowing it to tell its own story. The spelling was corrected in the diary by pen at a later date (in the heading only).

4 January 2005
Added story 42 A Near Approach to Wyld's Craig.
Added story 43 Clumner Bluff Blitzkrieg.
Added story 201 The Mount Styx Foray.
Numbered all the stories with their story number on the Index Page. I think this is an improvement, although Merryn Gilham (see below) seemed to see them as page numbers.
Corrected story 186 Loyetea Peak, which actually contained the Mts Peter and Paul story! Whoops, an oversight in the quality control department. Thanks to Merryn Gilham of Devonport for pointing that out.

26 December 2005
Added a link to the North West Walking Club's new and improved site. They have reciprocated with a link.

9 November 2005
Added story 96, Mt Maurice with the L.W.C.

18 October 2005
Added story 5, Conquest of Dry's Bluff.
Added a link to the new Launceston Walking Club website after they finally put a link in to mine. Reciprocation lives!
Changed stuff on the index page so that all illustrations are referenced. Included cute new little camera button instead of previous clunker.

6 October 2005
Added a picture sent to me by Norm Hoyle showing Chris Binks and himself standing next to an aircraft on Lake Pedder beach. Photo taken by David Pinkard.
Changed Lake Pedder page to be general Lake Pedder rather than specifically Keith Lancaster's Lake Pedder pictures.

30 September 2005
Added a picture by Norm Hoyle to the Easter at High Dome story.
Added a link to Luuk's website www.southwesttasmania.com.
Revamped the Index page with a second colour down the side bar. Not convinced it's an improvement yet.
Replaced the camera button and put linked camera buttons next to stories with photos.

08 September 2005
Added some page references to the Update Page, just to make life easier.

27 July 2005
Added Story 175, Mt Nereus at last. This was the last peak in the Cradle Mt. - Lake St. Clair National Park which Keith had to climb. Note that the Tasmap 1:25000 does not show a name for "Green Mt.".
Updated the Diary Register, now showing total of 108987 words.

14 June 2005
Added Story 19, Seven Mountains whilst on holiday tour.
Updated the Diary Register, now showing total of 106212 words.

14 May 2005
Changed the Index Page by adding a header made from the Anderson's Bluff panorama. Don't know if I will stick with it..

23-28 April 2005
Added Story 90, Easter at High Dome
Added small photo of High Dome to story.

21 April 2005
Updated the Diary Register to include word totals for completed stories. 99686 words so far...

11 April 2005
Added Story 82, LWC Trip to Vale of Rasselas. This story accompanied by photos (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) kindly supplied by Norman Hoyle.
Updated the Index Page and Diary Register

23 March 2005
Added Story 30, The second Wyld's Craig failure

20 March 2005
Added Story 29, Wonders of Mt Field West.

6 March 2005
Updated the Pages on the Website Register, and the Diary Register. The tally now stand at 25% of Keith's Diary on the website.
Added Story 66, A Traverse of the Eldons. This had been asked for late last year, but I can't remember who it was - one of the old-timers.
Reversed the date sequence of this record of Updates.
Added the Map of the Eldon Range on Page 142.1 of the Diary. Realised that the bottom bit is missing and that I will have to stitch it on. Will leave it on for now.

27 February 2005
Added Slide Register to the Admin page. May take it off again, because it is very large.

23 February 2005
Added Story 28, The first Wyld's Craig failure.
Moved Mt Owen off the Latest Additions list.
Added Occasional Record of Updates to the Admin Index page. I'm not yet convinced that it is of any interest to anybody but me.

December 2004
Added Story 64, A reconnaissance of the Eldons.
Added Story 65, Return to Legge's Tor.

August 2004
Added Story 71, With the Hermit of Gordon Vale. Keith's visit to Ernie Bond.
Added Story 51, Mt Dromedary.

May 2004
Added Story 160, Frankland Traverse and Bombadier Track.
Added Story 44, Beautiful Mt Byron.

April 2004
Added the Lake Pedder pages with the 7 (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7) Lake Pedder photos. There is a general scarcity of images of the original Lake Pedder on the web, so I decided to add Keith's available slides, mainly taken from the Franklands. They are not good quality, but are reasonably acceptable after some cleaning up done by my son Luuk at Stallards.

March 2004
Added Story 95, Mt Pillinger via the Forth Track.
Added Story 176, Schnell's Ridge. This has the first illustration from Keith's slide collection. Not an unqualified success.

January 2004
Added Story 86, The Mount Anne Group.
Added Story 225, Ben Lomond Once Again - a story of the 90's when Keith was still making solo trips.
Added Story 253, Exploring the Cameron Cluster. This is officially the last diary report of a trip made in 1997. There is pathos in how Keith describes his own physical limitations. He was 87 when he made this trip.
Added Story 166, Mts Peter and Paul.
Added Story 186, 187 and 188: Loyetea Peak, Mt. Everett and Rocky Mt and Mt Cattley.

December 2003
Added Story 87, The Foresight and the circuit of the DuCanes.
Added Story 130, Around Port Davey. This story was added after I read the Deny King book. It contains Keith's only reference to a meeting with Deny King and his wife.

August 2003
Added Story 123, Mt. Inglis in the snow.
Added Story 185, Pencil Pine Bluff. This was in relation to questions about the Innes Track, which Keith reported on in this story.
Added Story 108, Probing the Propstings.
Added Story 79, The Reserve.
Added Story 74, The Pillinger Track.
Added Story 4, Stack's Bluff.
Added Story 123, Mt Inglis in the Snow.
Added Story 177, Cape Pillar. Around this time Niels did the Cape Pillar trip with his schoolmates.

July 2003
Added Story 26, Cradle, Barn Bluff & Mt. Brown. Mt Brown was later renamed Mt Emmett.
Added Story 162, The Snowies and Jubilees.

June 2003
Added Story 154, Over the High Tops to Pedder.

May 2003
Added Story 157, The Franklands and Arthurs.

April 2003
Added Story 161, Algonkian Jungle Mountain and Story 41, Mt. Hugel.

January 2003
Added Story 3, Ironstone Mt. and Story 73, Adam River.

October 2002
Added Keith's Preface, Story 1, Mt Barrow, Story 2, Ben Lomond, Story 88, Frenchman's Cap, Story 200, Hobbs, Quoin and Brown Mts. The Preface is a nice statement of why Keith was climbing mountains, made at the beginning of his mountaineering career. Frenchman's Cap was also placed after transcribing it for Joyce and Hobbs, Quoin and Brown Mts contained Keith's record of his visit to my brother-in-law's farm, Ferniehurst, on which Brown Mountain is situated.

March 2000
Started website with Stories 75 and 80: Federation Failure and Federation Peak.
Added introduction page and, presumably, Adamsons Peak, Mueller Range, The Snowies and On Schouten Island, as these had been done as .docs in 1996. I remember doing the Schouten Island story for Joyce Reed.

000 Preface
001 Mt Barrow
002 Ben Lomond
003 Ironstone Mt
004 Stack's Bluff
005 Dry's Bluff
006 Mt Barrow with ease
007 Mt Arthur
008 Brady's Lookout
009 Mole Ck Lorinna Mt Roland
011 Ragged Mountain
012 Quamby Bluff
013 Stack's Bluff
019 Seven Mountains
026 Cradle, Barn & Brown
028 1st Wyld's Craig fail
029 Mt Field West
030 2nd Wyld's Craig fail
037 Walls of Jerusalem
041 Mt. Hugel
044 Beautiful Mt Byron
051 Mt Dromedary
054 Giants of the Reserve
063 Mt Owen
064 Recon of Eldons
065 Return to Legge's Tor
066 Traverse of Eldons
067 Mid-winter jaunt to Billop Bluff
069 Coal Hill Gould & Pyramid
071 Hermit of Gordon Vale
072 Vain Att @ Federation
073 Adam River
074 The Pillinger Track
075 Federation Failure
076 Adamsons Peak
077 Mueller Range
078 The Snowies
079 The Reserve
080 Federation Peak
081 Rock Problems Geryon
082 LWC to Rasselas
086 Mount Anne Group
087 Foresight and DuCanes
088 Frenchman's Cap
089 Heart SW Mountains
090 Easter at High Dome
095 Pillinger via Forth Track
096 Mt Maurice
099 The Weld Washout
100 the Dial Range
101 Mt Sedgwick & Tyndalls
102 Gordon Vale again
103 Thetis in the rain
104 St. Patrick's Head
105 Mts. Vandyke and Claude
106 Christmas at the Franklands
107 Mt Weld scrub bash
108 Probing Propstings
109 Sprent and Wedge
110 Mt Albert
111 Mts La Perouse and Hippopotamus
112 Tasmans Peninsula
113 Nicholls Cap
114 Freycinet Peninsula
115 Mt Cameron East
116 Across the Mueller Range
123 Mt. Inglis in the snow
130 Around Port Davey
140 Rogoona or Bust
154 High tops to Pedder
155 The Highland Lake Country
156 Walls of Jerusalem
157 Franklands and Arthurs
158 Traversing the Loddons
159 Mt Young
160 Frankland & Bombadier
161 Algonkian Jungle Mount
162 Snowies and Jubilees
166 Mts Peter and Paul
167 Mt Mayday and Stormont
169 Christmas 1963 in SW
170 Schouten Island
175 Mt Nereus at last
176 Schnell's Ridge
177 Cape Pillar
185 Pencil Pine Bluff
186 Loyetea Peak
187 Mt. Everett
188 Rocky Mt Mt Cattley
200 Hobbs, Quoin Brown Mts
204 Rebuffed on the Fields
225 Ben Lomond Once Again
253 Exploring Cameron Clust