Postcards from Australasia #13

So here we are at the end of our visit to Tasmania.  The weather was mostly shocking except the last few days, we walked in winds gusting at 60km/h, we walked in snow, sleet, hail and heavy, heavy rain, we even walked in moderate sunshine.   But we loved it, every minute of it.   What a magnificent place, lots of echoes of Scotland, our adopted home, lots of amazing landscapes, lots of fantastic wildlife and as the birthplace of the political environmental movement, lots of things we feel at home with too.

Visiting Tasmania has helped me fulfil my first life goal, awakened as I was by the campaigns to stop the damming of the Gordon River, back in the early 1980s, and by the threat of continued logging. The campaigns themselves started back in 1967 but the first major victory was in the 80s.   There's a very long way to go.

Anyway, to Tasmania.   To say i was excited to land in Hobart... I was shaking, over 30 years of anticipation.   Hobart itself is a medium-sized sprawl with various lagoons, causeways and interesting spots to visit, including Mount Wellington.   We tried driving up on our first day but the howling winds and the modest fencing on the road put me off about 80% of the way up, so we did some walking in the bush on the hillside, spotting amongst other species this rather stunning Pink Robin:

Already the rains were accompanying the winds.

We met my friend from my Antartica trip, James Stone (an award winning astro-photographer and all-round good bloke) the next day for a mooch in the botanic gardens and a dinner just (and only-just) protected from a monsoon-like downpour at dinner time that evening.

The next day we were somewhat at a loose end, but a colleague from the Falkirk Camera Club suggested a visit to Mona, the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart, which we'd not heard of.   It was the highlight of that area to be fair, we loved it!   The story of the owner, everyone we knew had something to add, and the museum itself, which hugely outshone the public museums we've visited so far, impressed.   This is one of the tunnels, bored out of the rock, the fittings art in themselves, a place of genuine genius:

From Hobart we headed to Bruny Island, home to all of the Tasmanian Bird endemic species, and stronghold of one in particular, the Forty-Spotted Paradalote:

We booked a day-trip with a guide, Dr Cat Young, and Inala tours and saw this amazing, vulnerable and rare bird very early on in the day, then we explored Bruny more widley, enjoying the landscape, birds and scenery before heading back off the Island and North, this time to Maria Island:

Maria is an island used as a home of last resort for endangered Tasmanian wildlife, including Wallabies, the Tasmanian Devil and this Flinders Island Wombat, all of which are in danger of becoming extinct in their home territories:

This doesn't include the growth in the Cape Barren Goose which Maria played a key role in too.  This was the first significant geographical mistake on our tour too, so next we headed down to Port Arthur to visit the convict colony there:

The solitary new model prison was heartbraking, nearly as tough to visit as the Female Factory at Cascades in Hobart, these two locations alone illustrate the horror and misery experienced by the transportees from the UK, more than 160,000 in all, a history and politics i wont explore here but on which I do have very strong opinions.

Anyway while exploring the Port Arthur penal complex, pretty much as soon as it opened to avoid the hordes, this Flame Robin popped up on the path:

From Port Arthur is was North again, back past Maria to Frecyinet National Park and our first sunny day on Tas.   The walk we did was outstanding, to the top of the overlook over Wineglass Bay, down to the bay itself:

And then back via Hazard Bay.  We loved it though it was probably the busiest walk we've done on this tour so far.

From Freycinet we headed up to Cradle Mountain.  The weather here really was shocking as was the 'boutique' hotel we'd booked which turned out to be an aged hut in a logging zone with no heating, but can't say too much about that as we're still waiting on a partial refund.   Caveat emptor...

We took the bus into the park but the winds, the snow and the hail persuaded us to curtail our planned hike and head instead to the Devils @ Cradle, a good decision in the end.   We dodged continuing wintery weather to photograph the Devils enjoying the brief dry, sunny moments, magic:

From Cradle we headed to Strahan on the West Coast and the peak of the bad weather, almost non-stop high winds and heavy showers to continuous rain, but we really enoyed the Gordon River Cruise, especially the non-stop sparkling wine and food, and being on a modern catameran, which made the whole thing smoother.

After Strahan we drove up to Maydena and then on to Strathgordon, the landscape was stunning and very reminiscent of Scotland:

This is Lake Pedder, the tannin tide washing on the hugely extended shoreline after the massive flooding brought on by the dam-building programme:

Lake Pedder was the start of the environmental movement and a big loss.   The Gordon River was the next big battle and the biggest win.   What a contrast.

From there we headed down to our last stay in Tas, in Launceston, or Lonny to the locals.   We stopped off at another Devils' breeding centre, this time the Trowunna Wildlife Sanctuary where i finally managed a snap of the Devils interacting the way they do in the wild (they're nornally asleep during visiting hours or snoozing if there's any sunbathing to be done):

What amazing creatures, i hope they hang-on:

From Launceston we undertook two longish roard trips, the first to the Northeast via Narawntapu National Park where we saw this Tasmanian Pademelon catching the morning warmth with its joey:

We ventured to Stanley, via Penguin before returning and then the next day starting our circuit out to the Northwest.   Our first stop on the way out was Bridport in Dorset where i finally managed a photograph of the endemic Yellow Wattlebird:

We saw our second White-fronted Chat further round the coast towards the Bay of Fires:

Named because of the lichen on the rocks:

We've really enjoyed our time in Tasmania and feel we've given the Island a good amount of time to explore and experience, next it's back to the mainland and continuing our journey West.