Yesterday we travelled from Lake St Clair to Cradle Mountain. Only did a couple of short walks enroute to our accommodation at Cradle Mountain. We stopped at Queenstown for lunch (on the West Coast) where the West Coast Wilderness Railway runs. In the afternoon, at Cradle Mountain, we went to Devils@Cradle to see their Tasmanian Devils and Quolls. The accommodation here is a bit rustic but comfortable.
Today we walked up to Marion's Lookout from Waldheim Chalet. It was cloudy,but not much rain, so views were restricted, then we walked around Dove Lake and views of Cradle Mountain finally unfolded at the end. That's the end of the Lake St Clair - Cradle Mountain National Park leg of the tour, now onto the East Coast.
Back online again. On Wednesday we drove from Maydena to our new accommodation at Lake St Clair, about 2 hours drive north west, where we stayed for two nights. On getting to Lake St Clair we were greeted with snow on the hills but even on our walk from Echo Point (we got there by ferry) and back to the lake we had some snow. The following day, no snow but wind and showers, so we weren't able to go higher than Shallow Lake which was more like the Atlantic Ocean than a lake. We did see some wildlife close and personal: leeches. Also saw some people that thought they were walking in a local park: wearing shorts and white sneakers. On getting back to the lakehead, I came across a Frenchman outside the National Park Visitor Centre who was complaining that the parks people were not able to tell him on which day the rain had started as it is not normal to have rain at this time of the year. I am not sure where he got his information from, but I told him it is not unusual to have rain in Summer in Tasmania. Later I saw him inflicting a photo shoot on an echidna, while snorting at it. Not sure whether he speaks echidna or what.
We had a slight problem in our group when two of them were unable to find their lodge in the dark. They had to go find the guides to show them the way. The accommodation at Lake St. Clair was excellent, I only had issue with the noisey fridge which started to make weird noises at 2am. Others in the group said they had the same problem!
Hello again. On day 2 of the tour we went to the Mount Dromedary Forest Reserve, near New Norfolk. Unfortunately due to road closures associated with the fires we couldn't do the planned walk in Mount Field National Park. Instead we went to this forest reserve. Unfortunately it was raining at the start of the walk and later we found that the track up to the tops was impassable. At least the rain stopped in the afternoon. One thing of mid concern were the two graves, marked with large crosses, located on a property near the start of the walk. Off to Lake St.Clair tomorrow.
Hello! Today (Monday) was the first day of our walking tour, our group of 12 walkers
and 2 guides left by bus for our first walking destination: Mount Field
National Park, about an hour west of Hobart. We did a few of the waterfall
tracks in the morning near the visitor centre - very pretty waterfalls and some very large trees in this rainforest section.
It was cloudy but no rain until after our walks, Unfortunately, due to
the fires near the National Park we couldn’t do some other walks in the
park. Instead we drove to Lake Peder, further south-west (on the way we saw some of the bushfire devastation). We then did a short
rainforest walk to Junee Cave, near our accommodation at Maydena.
Hello from Tasmania! Arrived in Hobart yesterday (Saturday) for my walking tour that starts tomorrow (Monday). Today I went up to Mount Wellington (the mountain that overlooks Hobart) and to the Wooden Boat Festival. The weather wasn't the best up the mountain but at least it didn't rain, although it was like being in Antarctica on top with fog and a strong freezing wind (it's 1271 metres high and therefore quiet exposed). I got off there very quickly.
The Trip to Hobart
As usual my plane was late taking off from Hobart due to a passenger turning up 10 minutes late. Although I suspect he was on a connecting flight from up north all of which were late coming into Melbourne. I was however concerned when the pilot announced after we got on the plane that we would land in Hobart at 2.20pm. The flight was scheduled to take off at 2.50pm. I think he was a bit confused but he did seem to know where he was going and how to fly the plane.
Hobart
It's certainly not a warm place. 17 yesterday and a balmy 23 today. Although atop Mount Wellington it was more like 1. Hobart is a lot hilly than I remember or it could be this time I am staying at a hotel on top of a hill.
Mount Wellington Walk
It didn't start off well. I had to take a local bus to the base of Mount Wellington before starting my walk at Fern Tree. Unfortunately, I got off the wrong stop (the last stop) which turned out to be a few kilometres past the start of the tracks. A couple also got off the same (wrong) stop as they thought I knew what I was doing. Gee did they make a big mistake. The bus driver very kindly let us ride on the bus back to the right stop for free. After that it was a grind at times, as I got higher the track became increasingly rocky but despite the weather the views on the way up were great. As I said on top of Mount Wellington it was like Antarctica but I was surprised by how many tourists were running around up there, some taking pictures of themselves in the fog. On the way down I went to a lookout from some cliffs and incredibly they had installed a child proof gate (like they have for swimming pools) to restrict access to it. People must sure be stupid around here.
Some pictures...
