I've been living in Australia for two weeks and besides looking for work and getting registered with medical insurance, a bank account and the like, I've been trying to work out exactly how hiking is going to figure in to my new life. I am not a newcomer to Australian hiking (bushwalking, as it is called here). On my past two visits to Australia, I have gone on three major bushwalks. I completed a successful winter traverse of the Overland Track in July, 2005 (see picture). I attempted a traverse of the Overland Track in August, 2007, but had my plans derailed by a three-day snowstorm on Cradle Plateau - I spent those days either waiting it out or slogging through waist-deep snowdrifts probing ahead on the track, only to turn around when the risk arose of running out of daylight. I followed the unsuccessful 2007 Overland Track hike with a successful hike to the Tulane Hut at the base of Frenchman's Cap (followed by another three days stranded at the Vera Hut waiting out one of the worst rainstorms in Tasmania in decades.) Bottom line, I am confident that I can handle myself out in the bush with due preparation and have the experience to lead a group as well. Be that as it may I am thinking about joining a bushwalking club, the Melbourne Bushwalkers. It should be a good way to get to know some people I might eventually go on hikes with. They require you to join them on three hikes before they extend membership to you, probably just to be sure you are not some weirdo. Now, while most of their hikes are very, very easy, they do have a few expert level (read, winter backcountry) hikes as well. Still in some way, I can't help but feel like it's a step back twenty years to a time when I depended upon the Explorer Post One outing club to help me go on the hikes I wanted to go on.