From Castle Hill or Mt Stuart, Smedley’s Hill looks like a bump on the western end of Many Peaks Range on the northern edge of the Town Common. On the ground, it’s more challenging and more interesting. The views from it are spectacular – looking along Shelly Beach towards Maggie, or north to the Palm Islands and Hinchinbrook, or up the coast.
I’ve been visiting the Common for years but had never tried to climb the hill. When I did, yesterday, I realised that it wasn’t the simple rounded shape we see from the south but a ridge running east-west (continuing, in fact, the line of Many Peaks) linked to a smaller peak to its north, right above the sea.
On the park’s trail map, the mountain bike track looks like it stays low on the slopes of the hill. (This googlemap, centred on the hill, will let you zoom in for more detail.) The trail does climb almost to the top of the smaller peak, however; and an active walker could scramble the last few metres to the summit, although leaving the track is discouraged.
I walked up the track rather than attempting it on my bike. Turning right after crossing the footbridge leads up to the saddle between the peaks before looping high around the smaller one and wandering back to the starting point via the south-east slopes. I left that for another visit, returning from the saddle via an unmarked service track and the Shelly Beach track which runs between the hill and the range proper.
P.S. “Why Smedley’s?”
I always assumed that it was the surname of local residents and a long-time Townsville resident confirmed that for me a few weeks after this post was published. She remembers them living there, more than 50 years ago, and thought that, “they may have been allowed to stay on, after the Common became a Conservation Park, until the old man passed away,” or words to that effect.
P.P.S. (March 2025)
This view from the lookout at the top of the Mt Louisa walking track shows the gap between the Hill and the Range better than our usual view from Castle Hill or the Common. The Bohle River is to the left of the shot and the floodplain in the centre drains into it.