14. Australia - Tasmania, heading for the mountains and the wilderness

covering 16 November to 20 November 2019

 

heading towards Cradle Mountain

Our target now is Cradle mountain which lies at the north end of the massive wilderness area so we loop across the top of the island to get there.  It’s all very green and wooded, very rural with small towns occasionally which didn’t immediately offer anything much to slow us down.  Perhaps a more detailed look would have helped but we had a destination in mind. 

Cradle Mountain

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It was cold hard rain when we got to the impressive and well heated Visitor Centre which was gently steaming inside due to all the damp visitors passing through.  We had to show our Parks Pass to get the free bus passes which would take us along the valley in the morning to where we wanted to have a walk.  Motorhomes are not allowed in at all and cars have to follow one of the buses if they want to.  Our campsite was almost opposite the visitor centre and was set in woodland with a lot of undergrowth.  The rain had not eased and everything dripped and dripped.  As we were tucked in to a van with central heating we were well insulated from it all.   The morning came, dull but drier and as we took breakfast one of the camp population of Pademelons (delightful looking small kangaroos) decided we were a soft touch for some food, sitting outside our van and looking pathetic.  It’s partner in crime, a Currawong (a large black crow like bird with a dangerous looking heavy and sharp beak) kept an eye on us too.  Victuals were not handed out and they eventually disappeared presumably looking for more generous visitors elsewhere.

Cradle Lake

Heather dressed for the weather

Our bus trip took twenty minutes or so and dropped us and a score or so of other people near a lake.  We signed into the visitors book like good walkers and viewed the very impressive landscape before us.  A range of mountainous peaks with jagged tops and wooded lower slopes sat as a backdrop to the lake, all covered in snow higher up and with more of a light dusting lower down.  It was accompanied by a fierce and very cold wind.  We’d decided on a walk which circumnavigated the lake and because it was now snowing we paused briefly to put all our waterproof/windproof gear on.  Thankfully, almost all the other people had miraculously and pleasingly disappeared within about five minutes of getting off the bus.  We hadn’t come to walk in the wilderness to be stuck with other people around us.  It was a lovely walk with the falling snow reducing the visibility but adding greatly to the atmosphere.  We were enjoying that special quietness that comes with a snowy landscape when it is actually snowing, assuming the snow underfoot isn’t frozen and crunchy.

Not being ready to stop yet we extended our walk to a coach stop further back from the lake and were rewarded with some great views of unconcerned Wombats feeding very close to the path.  They really do look very much like a cuddly toy with a jolly sort of face.  They’re chunky and about two feet long.  It had stopped snowing by now and brightened considerably although it was still very cold.  We ended up walking all the way back to the visitor centre which was a very good choice because we got some excellent views of Echidnas, one of our hoped for sightings.  These are a bit Hedgehog like to look at, and along with the Platypus are the only egg laying mammals.  The ones we saw were about fifteen inches long and had what looked like a mix of spines and fur with a tubular snout a few inches long.  They were like a cross between a worn slipper and Pinocchio.  We loved them for their cartoonish snuffling around.  These Echidnas and the one we saw later wandering across the car park at our campsite were clearly habituated to people.  Later ones we saw would scuttle away or lie flat to the ground with their head withdrawn if disturbed.

from our point of view, the elusive Echidna

For us Cradle Mountain was a great wildlife spot, we saw several creatures we’d hoped to and on our second day the only snake of our entire three months in Australia.  It was a Tiger Snake, about four feet long and lying just off the path on a very cold morning.  Being a reptile it doesn’t generate it’s own heat like us inefficient mammals but has to get warm from external sources, like a hot water bottle.  This one was vainly waiting for a bit of sun and lay there watching me with one eye displaying all the warmth of an ice cube. 

Tiger Snake - it doesn't develop the distinctive stripes til later in the season

some more magnificent seascape near Strahan

the Police house at Strahan

From here we headed to Strahan on the west coast before moving on to Queenstown with the intention of crossing the Wilderness Area on the only road to traverse it.  Queenstown is an old copper mining town which has a highly expensive tourist rack-and-pinion railway for tourists and nothing much else.  It’s in spectacular country and has the ‘famous’ gravel Australian Rules Football Pitch.  It all seemed a bit sad to me with the feel of a town that had died but didn’t know it yet.

a rack and pinion locomotive (made in Glasgow) at Queenstown

Part way across the traversing road, we called in at a gallery called The Wall in the Wilderness which contained a set of magnificent wood carvings.  These were large panels with relief carvings meant to show the history of Tasmania.  Some panels were standalone while others had a story covering several panels.   The intention is that when finished it will consist of 100 panels, each 1 metre wide and three metres high.  It was the isolated location of the place as well as the skill of the carvings and careful lighting which made it so impressive and well worth visiting.  Absolutely no photographs or mobile phones allowed so if you want to see any of it, you’ll either have to google it or vis it.

some mining scarred countryside, now in the Wilderness area