8 Weeks in Tassie - part 5.

We’d heard a lot about Queenstown, and because of what we’d heard, we were planning on driving straight through without staying.  But because of the long weekend, we thought we’d give the caravan park there a call and see if they had any space, as we thought Strahan would be busy.  The park had received good reviews on Wikicamps, and with a booking made, we headed off from Derwent Bridge to travel the 86km to get there.

The road down into Queenstown is said to have 99 bends and again, is a favourite of motor bike riders.  I wasn’t looking forward to the journey, but Doug didn’t seem to be worried.  As it turned out, for the most part it wasn’t too bad - certainly nothing worse that we’d done already - except for maybe the last 6-7km.  As we snaked our way down into Queenstown, round very narrow, sharp corners, I was holding my breath.  There was an awful lot of “down” on my side of the car!!

The deep, eroded gullies and naked, multi-coloured hills surrounding Queenstown, leave you in no doubt that it was a mining town.  The destruction of the surrounding area is a direct result of this industry, as are the now ghost towns of Linda and Gormanston on the outskirts.  

They have been mining gold here since the 1880’s till 1994. It was once the third largest town in Tasmania and by the 1920’s, the rain forested hills around Queenstown had been stripped bare, the timber being used to feed the furnaces smelting the gold.  Uncontrolled pollution from the smelters was killing any vegetation that hadn’t already been cut down, and bushfires raged through the hills every summer, fuelled by the sulphur-impregnated soils and dead stumps, until there was no regrowth at all.  The rains washed away the exposed topsoil until only bare rocky hills remained.  You can see why were had planned on just passing through.

But there’s scrub and trees returning to some of the hillsides and the landscape isn’t as stark as it once was, and Queenstown is making a real effort to promote itself as a tourist destination, especially now that the historic Abt mining railway between Queenstown and Strahan has been reconstructed.  And the couple running the caravan park (just bought 10 months ago) are also making a real effort to turn the park around - it was a lovely stay.  Queenstown has heart.

Queenstown in the sunshine

You can see that it has been a bustling town and although a lot of the businesses have closed, there’s still a good vibe in the main street.  We spent the day strolling through the old buildings, taking in all the information and displays in the town’s museum and driving out to various lookouts around the town.  We stopped to watch the heritage railway engine come into the station with it’s carriages full of people who’d enjoyed the trip, but we decided we weren’t going to take a ride this time.  We have to leave some things for the next trip!!!

Heritage railway

Lake Burbury from Mt Juke

Miners memorial in Queenstown

We moved on to our next destination, Strahan on the Sunday of the Labour Day weekend.  Strahan is 40km from Queenstown (big drive that day!) on Macquarie Harbour.  The little town of Strahan and Macquarie Harbour have played important roles in history, from the penal settlement of Sarah Island in the late 1800’s, to the hub of forestry and mining activity and, in my memory, the summer of 1982-3, when the town became the focus of the largest conservation battle ever fought in Australia: the battle to save the Franklin River from the construction of another HEC dam.  

It’s a sleepy little place, with lots of holiday accommodation and not much more to recommend it.  The reason we were there was for its location - the western wilderness and the wonderful Macquarie Harbour and Gordon River.  We had had our tickets booked for our Gordon River cruise for weeks now and were really looking forward to it.  

After setting up camp at the golf club (another great little free camp), we had a look around town at the various shops offering all things wooden.  In my last post, I explained that Huon Pine is only found in a few small areas now, and on the banks of the Gordon River in this wilderness area is the main one.  

Permission is now being given to harvest controlled amounts of fallen huon pine from the forest floors or from under the waters of the Gordon for commercial use.  There’s a great old sawmill on the foreshore of Strahan harbour which sells slabs of huon pine, smaller pieces and bits that have been turned into all sorts of wondrous things.  If we’d wanted some 2000 year old huon pine benches for our kitchen, this was the place to get them - for a cool $20K.  We also took a walk up to see Hogarth Falls, which lies at the end of a rainforest walk.

Hogarth Falls - Strahan

That night we took in a show!  It’s the longest running play in Australia, running for 24 years - The Ship that Never Was, which is performed in an amphitheatre on the waterfront every evening during the summer.  It’s a hilarious rendition of the true story of convicts stealing a ship from Sarah Island, the penal settlement in Macquarie Harbour in the 1800’s and is performed by just two actors (locals).  They cleverly erect the set as the story progresses and involve all the audience, getting some to join them on stage and all of us to perform sound effects etc.  It really was fabulous fun and I’d recommend a trip to Strahan for the show if nothing else.

The Ship that Never Was

Our river cruise was the next morning, and alas, the skies were grey and gloomy and there was drizzle not far away.  We had had such great weather up till then.  But we were determined to make the best of it.  Our cruise was with World Heritage Cruises (or the red boat).  There’s two cruise lines that operate out of Strahan and both cruises are similar, so we were told, but the red boat was a locally owned and family operated tour so we were keen to support them.

The Red Boat

The red boat is a large, two level vessel and we were allocated seats.  But once underway, we were able to wander around the boat as much as we liked.  It was a marvellous day out.  We first went through the heads of the harbour, called Hells Gates, and out into the ocean.  Thankfully the swell wasn’t too rough (but I’d taken my Kwells anyway).  

Lighthouse at Macquarie Point - Hells Gates

Macquarie Harbour is six times the size of Sydney Harbour so our day was spent cruising to various locations of interest in the harbour itself and then making our way into the Gordon River wilderness.  The harbour has a rich and dramatic convict and pioneer past. From 1822 to 1833, Sarah Island was the home of a harsh convict settlement, with logging and boat building from the locally sought Huon pine being the main trade.  We stopped off for a fascinating tour of Sarah Island, run by very entertaining and knowledgable guides (the same characters that performed in the play the night before).

Convict gaol on Sarah Island

Old bakers oven

A wonderful buffet lunch was served on board (fantastic local smoked salmon) as we slowly cruised up the Gordon River, and with a watery sun trying to show itself, we were stunned at the pristine wilderness we were seeing.  We had the chance to get off at a small jetty called Heritage Landing and do a boardwalk loop through the rainforest of Huon pines, then back on board to re-trace our steps down the river, back into the harbour and the throttle was opened up for our last leg back to Strahan.  This was one of the highlights of our time in Tassie and I’d recommend it to anyone.

Gordon River cruising

The long weekend was over and hopefully the crowds were abating, so we left Strahan and started making our way up the west coast.  We drove through the town of Zeehan and were hoping to stop for morning tea.  Of all the struggling towns we saw, Zeehan had to be the saddest.  It had been a vibrant and busy town in its heyday, with a Main Street over 2 miles long.  Now that the mines have closed, there’s rows of empty houses (miners accommodation) and shops and businesses closed down.  You really feel for the people left behind.

We moved on, trying to find somewhere to camp for the night nearby, as we wanted to do the walk in to Montezuma Falls, but we were struggling.  The free camp we had originally planned on turned out to be a bit dubious so we kept on driving.  We resigned ourselves to not doing the walk, although both of us were disappointed.  

We came across a little town called Tullah, another hydro town that had been abandoned after the power scheme had been built.  We spoke with the lovely ladies in the cafe/post office who gave us directions to a great little clearing beside Lake Mackintosh where we could camp for the night.  It was just beautiful.  Just goes to show, keep in with the locals.  We went back the next day to grab a coffee by way of thanking them, and stayed for a while, learning about how the town used to be when it was thriving.  There had been over 200 children at the school in the 80’s; now the school was closed and there was only 160 people in the town in total.

After leaving Tullah, we travelled all of 53km to the little town of Waratah, a heritage mining town on the edge of the Arthur-Pieman Wilderness area.  We made camp on the banks of the river in a great little caravan park and planned to explore the area for the next couple of days.

First on our list was a trip through Savage River down to Corinna.  The dirt road was in great condition so the trip only took us about 90 minutes.  Corinna is a tiny settlement on the banks of the Pieman River with no more than a pub, a few miners cottages, now restored for holiday accommodation and the national park campground.  And of course, the Fatman barge across the Pieman, Tasmania’s last surviving cable barge.  We had a walk around the settlement and stood watching the barge transport one or two vehicles at a time across the river.  The barge driver came and had a chat and asked if we’d like to take a trip across and back.  Well, we got to chatting so much that we actually took four trips across and back and at the end of that time, we’d been offered 5 weeks’ work - if we could start straight away.

Fatman Barge - Corinna

We did much humming and hawing on our way back out the road to Waratah, weighing up the pros and cons.  We both thought it would be an excellent opportunity and good fun, but we would have to change our ferry booking back to the mainland from the beginning of April to the first week of May.  With a large van in tow, spots on the ferry for us were very limited, and we’d heard of people not being able to get a berth until July.  So reluctantly, we contacted the people at Corinna and turned it down.  But who knows - there’s always another time (and I rather think Doug fancied himself as the ferryman!!!)

The afternoon was sunny but breezy and we enjoyed the sunshine and a G&T and as the sun set, we finally had our platypus moment.  In the river we saw not one, but three of them playing away without a care.  Doug was a happy man at last!!

The best we could do in a hurry

The next day we had planned to drive in to Cradle Mountain, but the weather wasn’t on our side again.  It was cloudy with the threat of rain.  Did we go?  Did we not?  We waited. We even accessed the webcam on the national parks website which shows what the conditions were from the carpark at Dove Lake to try and decide.  We had been told to not bother if the weather wasn’t good as the view of the “cradle” will be minimal.  But we decided to take the chance, hoping that the weather would clear for us.  The forecast for the next few days wasn’t to get any better, so why not?

Cradle Mountain is probably the most visited tourist attraction in Tasmania after Port Arthur, and as such we were braced for lots of people.  But because we had waited till nearly lunch time before arriving, the worst of the crowds had passed.  Either that or they were put off by the weather.  You arrive at the visitors centre and park, and then get a shuttle bus 8km down the road to Dove Lake.  There’s other stops along the way, with walks of varying degrees of difficulty from each stop, but Dove Lake is the trump card.

Cradle Mountain in the clouds

After registering ourselves for our walk, we set off on the 6km circuit around the lake, walking under the base of the “cradle” as we went.  Most of the walk was on boardwalks or rough pathways, and about half way round the rain started.  We had managed to sit and have our lunch in the dry, but after that, it was wet, wet, wet.  But the scenery was still stunning and the spectacular mountains, shrouded in mist and cloud added dramatic effect.  We completed the walk by around 3pm, and were thankful for those new rain jackets we’d bought in Hobart.  We hitched a ride on the shuttle bus back up to the visitor centre where a very welcome coffee was had.  It had been a wonderful walk - and we would just have to come back again for that money-shot of the mountain in sunshine.

Dove Lake Circuit walk

The Ballroom Forest under the cradle

Wet, wet, wet!

The weather continued to be wet, windy and now cold too so there was no sitting out with a G&T that day - we retreated inside the van and used our gas heater for the first time in Tassie that night.  Waratah is quite elevated and gets snow in winter - not that it was that cold for us, but after shorts and t-shirts recently, it was a bit of a shock.  Friday was to be no better, so we were faced with the decision - do we sit and shelter in the van in Waratah or do we drive further north in the hope that the weather improves.  No brainer really!!  Packed up and on the road again in record time, heading north.