Alison Stocker | Photo: Tasmania’s iconic Cradle Mountain seen across Dove Lake
We had packed many activities in to the three days of Shev and Matt's flying visit so we decided to have a few calmer days on Tregoning before we set-off with Martha to explore inland Tasmania. Perhaps the adrenalin-rush had subsided once Shev and Matt had left or it was simply a matter of timing, but the very next day (Thursday 13th February), I started to show symptoms of a cold. I ignored this for long enough to get half of Tregoning's cove-stripe and chain-plates washed and polished (the half I could reach from the finger-dock) but by the evening there was no denying the sore-throat, sneezes, and sniffles.
By the following morning, it had manifested itself as a nasty cold with a bit of a temperature by the evening. Yes, it did cross our minds to wonder if it was the dreaded coronavirus, of which we were hearing more and more each day but, quite frankly, there was too much snot and the coughing (especially annoying at night) was clearly a tickle from post-nasal drip. I was aware of suspicious looks when I had to cough into my elbow in public but we had no doubt it was a common-or-garden cold and I made sure that I washed my hands before and after every possible contaminating action.
I had hoped to participate in my second Tasmanian Parkrun on Saturday on a course around the Queen's Domain but it was obvious that I was not well enough. However, I did not want to miss the associated visit that we had planned to the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens. So while Randall did his heart-healthy power-walking around the hillside gardens, I joined Martha in a more leisurely stroll. Although not huge, the gardens have a very attractive location overlooking the Derwent River and Hobart Bridge. Near the entrance was the Arthur Wall, a stone and brick wall built in 1829 with furnaces and ducts to keep the wall warm enough for growing cold-sensitive fruit trees against it. This reminded me of my family's house in Hagley (in the 1970-80s) which was next to a similar wall that had been part of the kitchen garden of the nearby stately home, Hagley Hall.
The stone side of the Arthur Wall which was once heated
We visited most of the themed areas such as the Japanese-, French Explorers'-, and community food-gardens and particularly enjoyed the Subantarctic Plant House. With cold air being blasted into the room, it is modeled on specific sites on Macquarie Island which lies 830 nm southeast of Hobart. Although the Island is actually closer to New Zealand (610 nm southwest of Invercargill), it is managed by the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service.
The types of plants likely to be found on the Island fill the center of the room, while the walls are painted with harsh landscapes from the island, and the sounds of howling wind and various seabirds are playing. This 34 km by 5 km island is a rare example of uplifted deep-ocean crust and, sitting on the border of two colliding continental plates, it has frequent earthquakes. The westerly winds of the Southern Ocean whistle around this part of the globe with little land to hinder them, it rains or snow for 320 days a year, and the temperatures average 4°C in summer and below freezing in the winter. Thus, the flora is subantarctic and the island is the breeding ground for 100,000 seals and about 4 million seabirds. Protected now as a UNESCO World Heritage Area, from 1810 the island was plundered for fur-seals (exterminated within 10 years), elephant seals (70% of the population wiped-out over 50 years), and penguins (harvested until 1911). Sadly, current management of the island had to include the control of mice, rats, cats, and rabbits, an additional unwanted legacy of the century of exploitation.
The boardwalk between plants and rocks with coastal scenery painted on the walls of the Subantarctic Plant House
Proving that I was able to walk up and down the slopes of the Botanic Gardens, allowed me to convince Randall and Martha that I could accompany them on our inland tour and that I might tackle some of the gentler hikes at Cradle Mountain. This may not have been an entirely sensible plan but I was not going to miss this opportunity to see a National Park that Hillary and others had so strongly recommended.
Surprisingly pastoral scenery along the highways north of Hobart
So on Sunday, we set-off in the rental car, driving north on the A1 and then A5 through Bothwell (site of Australia's first golf course and good trout fishing) and onto the central plateau, called the Central Highlands. Having seen so many pictures of Tasmania's forest-clad mountains, we were a little surprised to pass through so many rolling hills of sheep pastures. We should have known better as this area between Hobart and Launceston was where the European settlers, often using convict labor, appear to have carved-out a piece of England...at least, as it would look in drought conditions.
Randall examines the circle of stones supporting the Steppes Sculptures
On reaching the 1,050-m (3,445 feet) high plateau, we saw a sign for the Steppes Sculptures. A short walk into the woods brought us to a circle of stones upon each of which was a carving of wildlife or historic events that were closely related to the Central Highlands and nearby Steppes Homestead. Managed by the Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Services, we got the impression that this site was something of a labor-of-love by the sculptor Stephen Walker. It was not mentioned in our Lonely Planet guide to Tasmania but maybe visitors are directed to it at local tourist information booths or signs.
Not much further along the road we crossed the Shannon River which is the outflow at the south end of yingina or Great Lake, the largest natural freshwater lake in Australia. The hydro-electric era in Tasmania started at this site from 1910 to 1916 when a small concrete dam was built across the outflow and water was directed down a canal to a lagoon from which it made a steep drop into the Valley of the Ouse through the hydro-electric turbines at Waddamana. Increasing demand led to the construction of the second Miena Dam with its concrete arches and buttresses in 1922, the second longest dam of this type in the world at that time. In 1967, a third, rockfill dam 22 m high (72 feet) was built just downstream of the arch and buttress dam and it was raised another 6 m (20 feet) just 15 years later. The purpose of the rockfill dam was to allow the lake level and capacity to be increased to reverse the direction of the flow of water to the north. By building a 6-km long (3.75-mile) tunnel through the northern rim of the Great Western Tiers (a ridge of mountains from which rivers flow north to the Bass Strait), power could be generated relatively close to the urban center of Launceston. When full, Great Lake holds 48% of Tasmania's total energy storage capacity.
The 27 concrete arches and buttress of the second Miena Dam lie in front of the third rockfill dam at the south end of yingina or Great Lake
From Great Lake, we drove through Launceston, Tasmania's second largest city with a population of 86,640. Located on the Tamar River (named after the English river that divides the southwest counties of Devon and Cornwall), Launceston was established in 1804. It was situated upriver of a military post that the British had established at George Town to deter the French from claiming Van Diemen's Land. Named after a town in Cornwall, for some reason the traditional pronunciation of "Lawnston" has been changed in Tasmania to "Lon-sess-ton", a sound that grates on the nerves of this former inhabitant of Cornwall. Still, there are some attractive parks and 19th century buildings, the latter well-preserved since the State's at-times sluggish economy never made it worth replacing the old buildings with new ones.
Clock-tower (completed 1910) on the Launceston Post Office which opened in 1891
Although it would have been interesting to have followed the trails alongside Cataract Gorge or taken a walking-tour of historic Lonnie (as the town is known by the locals), we had other objectives for the afternoon. We found our goal, the Tamar Ridge Winery, after a brief stop to admire the Tamar Valley from Brady's Lookout. This rocky outcrop is named for an escaped convict who became a notorious bushranger who used the site of the lookout to view potential victims on the road below and who was eventually hanged in Hobart for continued crimes including murder. My cold made wine-tasting pointless so I did some birdwatching while Randall and Martha sampled about half-a-dozen wines, of which they liked the sauvignon blanc and pinot noir but did not care for the rest.
Looking downriver along the Tamar Valley from Brady's Lookout over one of many vineyards in the region
With me now as designated driver, we continued west from the Tamar Valley to Devonport, Tasmania's third largest city (population 30,500), where Randall had booked us into a motel. Devonport is where the red-and-white ferries, Spirit of Tasmania I and II connect the Island with Melbourne on the mainland. After an early dinner, we drove out to see the red-and-white striped lighthouse on Mersey Bluff, a headland stretching into the Bass Strait, and from there we watched as one of the well-utilized ferries approached Devonport.
We then took the highway west out of Devonport, to where it meets the coast at Lillico Beach and, dressed as warmly as possible, we met our hosts for the evening's entertainment. Two lovely volunteers for the Lillico Beach Conservation Area greeted us at the start of a short boardwalk and between them and the various interpretive signs, we were given a thorough introduction to little penguins (a.k.a. little blue penguins and formerly fairy penguins). Although Randall and I were fairly familiar with these tiny penguins (the smallest in the world) and had seen them coming ashore at night in New Zealand, Martha had never seen them so we were anxious that some would appear.
Martha is introduced to a (former) little penguin as we are about to go on the viewing platform
It was late in the breeding season so the volunteers were not surprised that we did not see any come ashore at that location. However, under the protection of darkness a few mature molting penguins wandered around the artificial nests, under and near the red-lights of the boardwalk, because they cannot go to sea for at least two weeks while molting. There was also one young penguin that the volunteers think was the second of a pair that was rather small and misshapen. It appeared to be waiting for a parent to return but if no birds came to shore with food, its prospects did not look very good. So it was not quite the march ashore of the penguins that we might have hoped for but Martha and the several other visitors were happy to have seen several wandering around.
Just beyond the boardwalk, two little penguin (the hunched juvenile on the left) wander in front of shrubs in the darkness (no white lights of flash-photography allowed)
The following morning, we drove west and inland towards Cradle Mountain. We passed some spectacular rocky peaks on the way and also many fields with a purplish hue. The Keep Out signs confirmed our suspicion that these were meadows of opium poppies. They had lost their petals so we were seeing the seed-heads which are what is harvested to provide opiate alkaloids used in painkillers and other medicines. Tasmania produces almost half of the world's legal poppy crop, worth A$100 million a year. The growing and harvesting of the poppies is strictly regulated by the State government and access to fields is illegal. Given that the fields tended to be widely distributed rather than concentrated together, we assume that permits to grow them are spread around between many growers. We had expected the fences to be much taller and imposing and even though some were electrified, we also passed fields with gates left wide open. The warning signs confirmed that the unrefined sap from poppies is toxic.
A surprisingly modest fence protects a field of opium poppies with a sign warning that "ILLEGAL use of crop has caused DEATHS"
On arriving at Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park, we knew that we wanted to get a multiple-visit National Park pass so we went into the brand-new Visitor Center. The car-park was still being constructed and many young landscape plants were protected by new netting. Inside the Center we purchased a car pass that covers entry to Tasmanian National Parks for eight people for two months for A$60. It seemed like a bargain to us. The park ranger recommended that we take a photo of the pass which had been printed from the cash-register. It was lucky that we did because when we left it on the car's dashboard (as required) the sun turned the whole ticket black!
The new Visitor Center at Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park to which we were greeted by the pakana (Tasmanian Aboriginal people) who have had a continuous connection with the country for over 45,000 years
Associated with the new Visitor Center, it is now required that park visitors use shuttle-buses to access the rest of the Valley. Cars are only allowed to enter very early or late in the day or to get to the lodges near the entrance. The buses were all filling-up so we took one to the last (fourth) stop at Dove Lake with the intention of making other stops on the way back. We has selected this day to visit Cradle Mountain because the forecast was for good weather but we wanted to be sure that we saw the iconic scenery in optimal conditions. There appeared to be some clouds towards the mountains as we left the Visitor Center but by the time we reached Dove Lake the sky was almost completely clear.
Cradle Mountain seen over Dove Lake with Glacier Rock on the lakeshore (about a third of the way from the left)
There are many well-marked trails in the area including routes up the mountain (6 to 8 hours return) and beyond on the Overland Track to Lake St Clair, a hike that takes several days. The Overland hikers were obvious at the Visitor's Center with their loaded backpacks. Normally I would have been keen to try one of the medium length trails (2 to 3 hours) such as around Dove Lake, up to Crater Lake, or to Marions Lookout but with all of this activity I was not shaking off my cold so I knew that I was not really fit enough for such ambitions. Instead, the three of us started with a very gentle walk around part of Dove Lake to Glacier Rock, where a viewing platform provided particularly impressive views of the main peaks.
Weindorfers Tower (left) and the summit of Cradle Mountain (1,545 m or 5,069 feet)
The jagged peaks of Cradle Mountain are composed of dolerite (the same subvolcanic rock we had seen creating columns on the Tasman Peninsula) and during the Ice Ages, they would have been the only land visible above the ice sheets that covered central Tasmania. Tasmania is the part of Australia with the most landscape shaped by glaciation. There is evidence of three glacial periods affecting much of western Tasmania whereas on the mainland only about 25 km2 (10 miles2) on the Mount Kosciuszko massif was affected during the last glacial period, 20,000 years ago. Mount Kosciuszko in southern New South Wales is the highest point on the Australian mainland at 2,228 m (7,310 feet).
The surface of the Cradle Mountain glacier would have been just below the dolerite columns and, as it flowed downhill, the glacier scoured out of the ancient quartzite bedrock, the basin that would subsequently be filled with Dove Lake. Glacier Rock is scarred with grooves that were gouged-out by rocks embedded in the 100-m (330-feet) thick ice. Such scratches are oriented in the downhill direction of the glacial flow which, when it receded at the end of the Ice Age, left terminal moraines down the valley at Ronny Creek.
While Martha took a bus back to the Interpretive Center at the main Ranger Station (the first stop from the Visitor Center on the bus-route), Randall and I walked down the Lake Lilla Track to Ronny Creek (the third of the four bus stops). It was a very pleasant downhill stroll past Lake Lilla to the marshy area where Ronny Creek joined the Dove River. That area was bordered on the downstream side by the glacial moraines through which the river, and road, had been carved.
Randall on the boardwalk over tussocks of buttongrass near Ronny Creek
The area around Ronny Creek was covered with golden clumps of buttongrass, much of which we crossed on a boardwalk. In the wetter areas around the streams, were clumps of a taller plant that looked like a pineapple-top on steroids. These were pandani (a.k.a. giant grass trees) which we learned, much to our surprise, can grow up to 12 m tall (40 feet) and are the world's tallest heaths (the family Ericaceae that contains such diverse plants as heather, cranberries, blueberries, and azaleas).
Pandani plants near the Dove River
The boardwalk around Ronny Creek was liberally decorated with small piles of the highly recognizable cuboid scat of wombats. We looked out into the buttongrass but it would have been very difficult to identify a wombat among those plants, but a little further along we noticed one nonchalantly grazing on a bank above the boardwalk.
A wombat grazing below the Waldheim Chalet near Ronny Creek
At last! Our first sighting of a live wombat in the wild...what a thrill. Thoroughly used to people, it seemed completely oblivious to the many walkers passing by on the boardwalk or stopping, like us, to take numerous photographs. Compared to the young wombats we had seen at Bonorong with their silky grey fur, this alpine adult had a thick, shaggy brown coat.
A shaggy adult wombat near Ronny Creek
We did not visit the Waldheim Chalet but it was built by Austrian-born Gustav Weindorfer and his wife Kate not long after he stated from Cradle Mountain's summit in 1910, "This must be a national park for the people for all time. It is magnificent, and people must know about it and enjoy it." They built the chalet and road to it to encourage people "to come from everywhere to see this place." It was their vision that led to the park's declaration as a scenic reserve in 1922 and a National Park in 1947. Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park, which includes Tasmania's highest peak, Mount Ossa (1,617 m or 5,305 feet), is now incorporated in the 1.4 million ha (5,404 mile2) Tasmanian Wilderness UNESCO World Heritage Area which covers almost 20% of Tasmania, mostly in the southwestern part of the state.
A black currawong shamelessly begging at a picnic table at Ronny Creek
Once we had taken enough photographs of our first wild living wombat, we passed several others on the grassy slopes beside the boardwalk to Ronny Creek. We had intended to catch a bus there back down the valley to meet Martha but I talked Randall into continuing along the boardwalk trail as it wound downhill beside the stream. Or so I thought. I should have paid attention to the name of the next bus stop...Snake Hill. So the last part of the walk was rather more steps going up the side of the river valley than intended but it made us appreciate the relaxing wait on the bus stop benches for an empty bus.
We finally caught a bus (standing room only) that dropped us at the Interpretive Center where we met Martha. After reading some of the posters and watching a short film, we strolled along a loop trail through some rainforest (plenty of moss) to a modest waterfall. A short bus ride took us back to the Visitor Center and car and from there we drove back to the coast at Burnie. The large hotel that Randall had picked seemed a little dodgy but we had a delicious dinner at the very nice beach-side Bayviews Restaurant, on the top floor of the Surf Life Saving Club.
As forecast, the next day was overcast and had an eventual downpour of rain. We were very thankful that we had chosen to go to Cradle Mountain on a fine day. We drove west along the coastal highway to Stanley, a small town about halfway down a long inverted-L-shaped headland into Bass Strait that separates Sawyer Bay (east) and Perkins Bay (west). While I am sure that the town has much to recommend itself, including Highfield Historic Site, an 1835 homestead which "is an exceptional example of domestic architecture of the Regency period in Tasmania" (Lonely Planet), we had come to see The Nut.
Although one might be forgiven for expecting this to be a superlative model of a walnut (given the Australian penchant for the World's/Southern Hemisphere's biggest this or that), in fact, it is a volcanic plug. Known by the area's Indigenous people as Monatteh, this flat-topped headland-off-a-headland was named Circular Head by Matthew Flinders on his 1798/9 circumnavigation of Van Diemen's Land. This 12-million-year old core of an extinct volcano is 143 m (479 feet) high with almost sheer sides all around and is now called The Nut. This name was presumably coined by someone who had an obsession with the type of hardware commonly associated with bolts.
Randall climbing the Stanley Nut under the non-operating chair-lift with Sawyer Bay beyond
Hearing that the views from the top are impressive, we had been looking forward to an effortless ride to the top of The Nut in the chair-lift that operates daily from September to May. By chance, we arrived at 9:30 am when the lift was due to open but there was no sign of activity. Sadly for us, the dark clouds and a rumble of thunder had discouraged the lift operators from opening and they did not know when it would be safe. So while Martha, sensibly, decided to wait at the bottom exploring the attractive gift-shop, Randall and I commenced the short but steep climb to the top.
Randall demonstrates the steepness of the path up the Stanley Nut
Part of the way up, we saw a forest raven (the only corvid in Tasmania so easy to identify) with a large white egg in its mouth. At least, that is what we thought it was until the raven, flustered by two other people stomping up the path, dropped its load which then bounced down the concrete path until it landed in the adjacent grass. When we expressing surprise that it was in fact a golf-ball, the other climbers cheerful informed us that on their golf-course (somewhere in Victoria), there is a frequent a problem with ravens stealing the balls from the fairways. The raven bounced down the path to recover the ball, scrambled a bit further ahead of us all and then dropped the ball in some long grass by the path. Still watching us, the raven flew to a safer position so that we could pass by while the ball was secured from rolling away and was safe out of our view. Cunning birds these corvids.
A forest raven carrying a golf ball on Stanley Nut
Once we made our rather breathless way to the top of The Nut, we followed the loop trail in a clockwise direction (as helpfully advised by Dina) so that we went down the many widely spaced steps and up a gradually sloping path. Our walk was hastened by the sight of heavy rain approaching across the sea so we only stole a quick glance at each of many viewpoints. Most of the summit was covered with tall grasses and short shrubs, amongst which were many muttonbird (shearwater) nesting tunnels but there was also a small wooded section. While scampering through these woods, we noticed a pair of padamelons (the smaller-than-a-wallaby-jumparoos) lurking under the trees.
Mother and joey padamelon in the woods on Stanley Nut
Closer inspection revealed many padamelons in the woods, some of which seemed oblivious to yet more visitors and others of which quietly jumped deeper into the protection of the trees. Martha and Randall had caught sight of a padamelon at the bottom of the chairlift so we knew that some were in the area but this was a surprisingly large population. We noticed more as we rapidly descended the path but, fortunately, we did not linger for long.
Randall looks at a padamelon grazing beside the tall grass (to the left) near the path on Stanley Nut with Perkins Bay beyond
Just as we reached the shelter of the gift-shop and café at the bottom of the chair-lift, the heavens opened and it poured with rain. There is no doubt that almost every part of Australia needs more rain so we were not sorry to see it bucket down, but we were very thankful that we had been able to visit The Nut and return before getting soaked. An ice-cream each seemed like an appropriate way to celebrate our good fortune.
In our haste to get to The Nut before the rain, we had not stopped to get a picture of it from a distance. When we left, I managed a photograph only of a rather darker block of grey on a grey horizon so that was the only disappointment of our trip to Stanley...well, that and the closed chair-lift. This was just as well because our stops for the rest of the day were not very exciting. Rocky Cape National Park is supposed to have some excellent hikes but, in the rain there was not much to see and we had no desire to walk in a downpour. By the time we stopped at the base of the lighthouse and at the viewpoints on the steep-sided Table Cape, the rain had stopped but the views were not impressive. So we continued into the neighboring town of Wynyard and stayed at the very pleasant Waterfront Wynyard motel. Being cheap, we opted to share motel room rather than get two or pay about the same as two rooms for the "absolutely sensational 'Coastal Pod' suites constructed from shipping containers" (Lonely Planet). Although this arrangement usually suits the three of us, I was unable to suppress my coughing at various times during the night, so getting another room or suite would have been a good idea. We were all a little irritable in the morning but were somewhat soothed by the truly excellent breakfast buffet.
Although there was plenty more to see in northwest Tasmania, we had decided to return to Hobart on Wednesday so that Martha was not rushed to prepare for her flight home on Friday. It was also becoming obvious that I needed more rest if I was to fully recover from this cold. It was going to be a long day of driving mostly on the main western highway A10. We stopped for a short rainforest walk (plenty of mosses) in the Hellyar Gorge State Reserve before being reunited briefly with the part of the A10 we had taken when we left Cradle Mountain.
Low clouds caught in the distant trees along the Hellyer River
We had expected to go right at this intersection and were confused by the signposts so we took a wrong turn. Only as we entered the rural community of Waratah, which we had clearly not seen before, did I realize that we were on the B23 heading west, rather than still on the A10 going south. It was a frustrating detour along which we had to back-track because there were some extensive roadworks but it did give us our first good look at a set of traffic-lights that counted down the 10-minute wait in 60-second increments.
Only 4 minutes left in our wait at the extensive roadworks near Waratah
After crossing the wide outflow of Lake Mackintosh at Tullah, we left the A10 for a short-cut on the B28. This route was a bit more mountainous than the A10 and provided some beautiful vistas across the Murchison Valley and south to Mount Tyndall. We did not dally for long as we were determined to get back to Hobart before dark, after a stop at Lake St Clair. Not long after rejoining the A10, we entered Queenstown on the western side of the West Coast Range of mountains.
Looking east towards the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park from the B28 near Mount Murchison
Unlike Queenstown in New Zealand's South Island which is a gorgeous mountain resort-town, Queenstown, Tasmania, cannot be described as beautiful. It has some striking buildings from its boom-town days at the turn of the twentieth century and the town is surrounded by steep-sided hills.
Queenstown Post Office, opened in 1902
However, large parts of many of those hills are still denuded of topsoil and vegetation thanks to the mining boom that started in 1883 when a pair of brothers searching for gold discovered an "Iron Blow" on the ridge between Mount Lyell and Mount Owen. The oxidized rock formation and surrounding large iron boulders indicated an area likely to be rich in minerals below the surface. Mining for the small amount of gold present did not prove to be very profitable but by 1888, when rich deposits of silver had been found in nearby Zeehan, Mount Lyell's geology was reassessed and large amounts of copper were identified. Surrounding areas were discovered to have amazingly diverse mineral resources including not only gold, silver, and copper but also iron, zinc, tin, lead, and rare minerals such as osmiridium (a natural alloy of the metals iridium and osmium).
Looking south from the A10 towards Queenstown in a landscape scarred by mining
With several financial institutions collapsing due to over-speculation, it took a few years for the copper mines at Queenstown to become established. Luckily, the discovery at Mount Lyell of a rich vein of silver, which could be transported to Zeehan for smelting, helped to keep the copper mine afloat until the investment climate recovered in 1896. Later that year, with the first copper smelters lit in Queenstown, Mount Lyell was being touted as the greatest copper mine in the world.
However, this bounty was extracted at a terrible cost to the surrounding environment. At first, all of the nearby forests were denuded to provide support-posts for the mine shafts and tunnels and supplementary fuel for the smelters. The latter really needed coke, which was going to be expensive to import to Queenstown. Instead, a process called pyritic smelting was developed at Mount Lyell which depended upon the combustion of pyrites (a.k.a. fool's gold). A common mineral in the area, pyrites is iron sulphide and the incendiary nature of sulphur is well-known, having been called brimstone (meaning burn stone) in Biblical times. Robert Sticht, a world expert in pyritic smelting, had been unsuccessful with the process in Montana but he had continued to experiment until he was approached by the Mt Lyell Company in 1883. Convinced of the ideal conditions provided by the pyrite-rich ore in Tasmania, Sticht developed a suitable furnace which was first lit in 1896 and proved to be hugely successful. He was appointed mine manager and became very wealthy over his 25 years of employment at Mt Lyell, after which new floatation technologies replaced pyritic smelting.
The burning of the sulphur-rich pyrites caused the second harsh assault on the Queenstown environment because the smoke produced was the toxic gas sulphur-dioxide. With Queenstown's high annual rainfall, what remained of the forests was killed by the clouds of smoke causing acid-rain (sulphuric acid) and, without the vegetation, the topsoil was soon eroded away. While regrowth has slowly occurred in the valleys, the steep sides of many of the surrounding hills are likely to remain denuded of soil and vegetation for decades.
A hillside on the A10 almost devoid of soil and vegetation as a result of acid-rain from early mining operations
While I found the landscape rather depressing, Randall was fascinated by the orange and pink mosaic, as were many artists over the years. Although some copper-mining continues, the pollution that it creates is strictly monitored and limited. Queenstown is suffering the economic effects of several mine closures but it is trying to reinvent itself as a tourist destination. One popular site is the Iron Blow Lookout which is the decommissioned open-cut mine where the local industry started. The deep cut is filled with emerald green-water and you can get "an eagle's-eye view from the 'springboard' walkway projecting out into thin air above the mine pit" (Lonely Planet). Sadly, we did not read this description until we were well past the turn-off. Randall would have liked the historic site, I would have loved the 'springboard'.
Instead, we kept going east until we turned off the A10 highway at Derwent Bridge which is at the south end of the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park. A short drive took us to the Visitor Center on the southern shore of Lake St Clair where we were pleased to display our Park Pass and eat a late picnic lunch.
Lake St Clair was carved by glaciation and is the deepest lake in Australia at 167 m (548 feet) deep. It sits at 737 m (2,418 feet) above sea level and it is the source of the Derwent River which reaches the sea in Storm Bay just south of Hobart. Aboriginal people called the lake Leeawuleena, which means "sleeping water". There are a few short and day-length walks from the Visitor Center at Cynthia Bay but the earnest-looking groups with large, full backpacks were arriving from, or starting on, the multiday Overland Track. We had seen similar groups at the Track's other end at Cradle Mountain. An alternative hiking option that would be very attractive on a return visit with more time, is to take a private passenger-ferry from Cynthia Bay to Narcissus Bay, at the lake's northern end, and then walk back the length of the lake on the Overland Track.
While Martha examined the exhibits in the Visitor Center, Randall and I took a short walk around the Playtpus Bay circuit. Overlooking Platypus Bay, there was an extensive wooden wall with viewing-holes to hide people from the wildlife in the water. The wall was covered with plenty of information about platypuses, the most significant of which for us was that they are only likely to be seen at dawn or dusk. We did already know this but we were still hopeful that there was just one platypus that did not. Alas, they all knew that the early afternoon was time to be in their nests so, predictably, we had no sighting.
Platypus Bay on Lake St Clair
Once reunited at the car, we took the A10 back to Hobart, following the general route of the Derwent River. Just south of Lake St Clair we passed a sign for the "Wall in the Wilderness" which cost A$15 per person. Given our reluctance to drive after dark we gave this a miss but we were subsequently assured that the 100-m long panorama, hand-carved out of wood was well-worth a visit. Apparently, the details of this depiction of the history of the Tasmanian highlands, down to hairs on arms, are absolutely stunning. Oh well, next time...
Having arrived back at the boat on Wednesday evening, we had a full day to recover from our three-day road-trip before we had to get Martha to the airport. It had been lovely to have her company for two weeks but we now had just Saturday to do the laundry and prepare for our next guests, Roger and Katie. Since we expected to take Tregoning out of the marina for a few days, Randall hurriedly fixed the windlass with the new solenoid that he had ordered online. We were very fortunate that he was successful because almost as soon as he put his tools down, he started to feel really exhausted and congested. Sadly, just as I was starting to feel that I was getting over my cold, he was coming down with it. But, as they say, with Roger and Katie arriving on Sunday morning, the show must go on!