Five-minute read: Mary Hyland spends five days in Mt Jerusalem NP with her son and loves what she discovers.
It was into the remote Tasmanian Mt Jerusalem National Park my partner and I planned to walk when he injured his knee. We invited our son, 25 – skinny black jeans, all North Fitzroy coiffured hair and infrequently active – to come instead and we expected reluctance, but he said, "I’d love to, Mum." Which is how I came to be standing on top of Mount Jerusalem discussing spirituality with my son in air so crisp I thought it capable of cracking.
We had climbed slowly up the winding ascent to the top of Mount Jerusalem and the view seemed to encompass space and time in a landscape so ancient and majestic. Water was everywhere, and the bright lime cushion plant’s illusion of softness stood out in a vista of green, the temptation to touch constant.
The walk was competently guided with a mix of friendly walkers and another parent/adult-child combination. When the temperature is -4°C, everything is icy cold and dark, and things are funnier, sadder and just more interesting. There were stories of adventures, of death, sadness, disappointments and dreams. There were philosophical disagreements, social commentaries, history lessons and calls for modernisation of some of our thoughts before the sanctuary of our warm sleeping bags beckoned.
Exhaustion was a stranger to the sure-footed young adults who were strong and walked without hesitation, while the older were slower, tentative, but just as able. Sharing a tent with my 183cm son was a treat. Top and tailed, pressed into our respective sleeping bags, we then shared comfortable silences surrounded by the noises of the park at night.
I had learned I did not know the beliefs and thoughts of my now-grown son, as I would have thought I did. Five days is a long time to be in someone’s company and I liked the man he had become. There was physicality to our relationship we had appropriately lost when he was a teenager.
The need for warmth, when standing still on the platforms, the mountain, and by lakes but mostly it was shared awe, the shared discomfort, achievements, the silences and the time spent together without distraction. I thought about whether he now had a different view of me but I didn’t ask.
Afterwards my son talked about how he had enjoyed the walk, how he wanted to do more, how he planned to walk the Walls of Jerusalem again, but in the snow, in snowshoes with his dad and some mates.
My son told me a few weeks later, back in North Fitzroy, that his mate had said, "Hey dude, you’re so happy, man. I mean, you usually are but it can’t have made you this happy." He is currently trail walking in British Columbia.