Last week, when we were discussing dad, Greg recalled the time when he felt that our relationship with dad had switched, the moment when instead of being dependants, we became the depended upon. I have already given my version of this moment. It was about 1985, just after dad's retirement, and in particular there was an evening at the Imperial Peking restaurant where dad, instead of appearing urbane and in control, seemed to defer and dither in a way that I had not seen before.

For Greg, it was about the same time, but a different occasion. Dad had for a long time raised the idea of the three of us going into the bush together for, I guess, some belated 'bonding'. For Greg and I it was not important, but as dad gathered his maps and equipment, and kept the subject alive, we were content to go along with it. About Christmas time I was back in Australia, and dad had finally planned out a walk on the six-foot track through the Blue Mountains. We were to spend three days together, fully self-sufficient. camping at two places along the way. It was in the final lead up to departure for the mountains that differences in thinking started to emerge.

Dad seemed locked into some 1950's model of bush-craft. He bought, and intended to carry, two of everything. His clothing and equipment was all rugged and heavy: wool sweaters and steel tools. When it came time to assemble, dad's backpack was twice as tall and twice as heavy as mine or Greg's. We both prevailed upon him to discard the weight, but he seemed intent on making things tough, as if this was what it was all about. Eventually, Greg and I stopped wasting our breath. The morning came to leave.

We left the train station at Katoomba and walked the few kilometres to the start of the track. I simply could not walk as slowly as dad, so I moved ahead and set up a photo of the three of us at the head of the track. In it, Greg and I seem fit, glistening, dad already looks spent. Dad, as was to be expected, complained of the heat and sweating, but for Greg and I there was nothing unusual about the day; it was summer, after all.

The six-foot track begins with a long and steep descent into the Megalong Valley. Each step is a big drop down, hard on the knees and quadriceps, especially with a pack. It became quite clear quite early that dad could not do this. Greg and I took a different approach to this problem. I wanted dad to realise that he had made a mistake and stash half of his gear in the bush, for retrieval after the walk. Greg, instead, swapped packs with dad. Even so, dad was still much slower than Greg and I. We would walk ahead and find a good place to stop, or see something interesting off the side of the track and make a detour. Each time we waited for dad to catch up we offered to let him take a rest, but he wouldn't.

Soon he was getting confused.

'We must be getting near the camp site. I can hear children.'
'I didn't hear anything, dad. And the camp site is still 5 kms away.'

Greg took a photograph of me standing in a river, having just tipped a hatful of water over myself. In the background is a bandy-legged man, bent under his pack, still hobbling towards us.

That evening, at the campsite, dad was too exhausted to do anything. Greg and I made the food and set up the tents. Then two things went wrong, and were to reset the entire context of the trip. Greg stepped on a piece of glass and cut his foot, and I discovered that I had lost my wallet somewhere along the way.

I considered the options at this stage. The first was to forget the wallet, persevere with Greg's cut foot, and continue for two days, including the hard section with no water that we would encounter the following day, and finish the walk. The second was to turn back in the morning, look for my wallet as we retraced our steps, and give Greg only one day of hiking on a cut foot. The other issue of course, was whether dad could actually survive another two more days.

I decided that we had to turn back. Dad was not in favour of it, but had no power to affect the decision. He was desperately disappointed, and I was regrettably unsympathetic. In the morning, I set off at a fast pace and retraced all my steps, even criss-crossing areas where Greg and I had paused and waited for dad. At the head of the climb I waited for what seemed like an eternity, but could see no sign of either of them, and so headed back to the train. I cannot remember who got home first.

Over the next several days dad sat silent and dejected in his armchair, unable to muster any enthusiasm for conversation, meals, or anything. He had been planning for our hike together for years and, when it finally came to pass, it had failed. And, more importantly, it was evident to him, or so he thought, that he had missed the last opportunity to undertake such a walk. He had been unfit for it, and had passed into old age. He felt the full weight of failure upon him. And I rubbed it in, pointing out how right I had been about the amount of gear he had packed - although, as Greg carried dad's pack and was still faster than dad, it was not a matter of weight at all. Over twenty years later, I still regret my behaviour during those few days. It may have seemed that the relationship of dependency had reversed, but clearly I had not accepted the responsibility of my new role.