Fire and ice

Leaving Hobart to go north west into the wilderness country we spotted a mobile sign that was perhaps a little ominous- " Total Fire Ban Today"!
It has amazed us just how quickly the bush has become tinder dry, three days ago we had thunderstorms, then the following day a heatwave of 38 Deg C with a hot wind from the north. That was the day that the Forcett fires started, along with others in this state, and some are still burning.




,We had been careful to check that there was no danger on the roads we were to use but as we travelled we could see fires on the hills around us.
A lot of smoke billowed across the road at times, we stopped to buy some raspberries at a roadside stall and were told that a cherry farm just a couple of kms away had lost all his trees.
It is devastating for these farmers- I have no idea if they will be compensated, but it must really put them off trying again, as these crops take quite a few years to fruit.

We made our way through the hills and forests to Lakes Gordon and Pedder, two reservoirs created to generate electricity in the middle of the last century. !5% of Tasmania's power comes from the three turbines just along from the dam, which has also created a tourism interest in the area. When we were there it was quite quiet, perhaps because of the bush fires, but that is how we like it.

We bush camped beside Lake Pedder, at a lovely natural beach, with great views We watched as the sun set over the mountains to the west, but ominously we could see billowing smoke to the south of us.  Fortunately, or perhaps not so fortunately for the animals in that area, it is total wilderness down there, only accessible by foot or horseback, so the authorities may allow it just to burn out.

During the night we had visitors, I was sound asleep but Anne heard them in our washing up bowl and looked out and saw a mother and baby wombat snuffling around. She described them as very small bear like creatures, not at all fazed by having our red light shone on them. ( As it was dark I had to cheat with this picture, we spotted a postcard and photographed it!)





This morning we headed back along the road we had come up yesterday, to join the A10 towards Queenstown and the coast. Although just 400kms, well within our short day's travel, the hills, twists and turns we encountered made it a very long day indeed. Some wonderful mountain views, lovely lakes and forests also tended to delay us, some of them are over 5000ft high, and indeed one of the passes we had to traverse was more than 3000 ft up. These mountains, valleys and lakes were formed during the Ice Ages, when glaciers passed through and left morraines.
On the way we stopped to see "The Wall", a hand carved timber panel three mtrs high and over 100 mtrs long, a work in progress by a guy called Greg Duncan. Worth seeing, it depicts the animals of the forest and a history of this region, but they were insistent that no photos could be taken of it.



Eventually we breasted a hill and spotted Queenstown far below us.Not a pretty site! The hills surrounding the town  are almost bare, a legacy of the polution caused by gold, copper and tin mining of the 19th and 20th century. 42 miners died in a fire in one mine in the 1920s, but gold is still mined there, albeit a little more carefully than in earlier days. There has been a move to try to re-establish forest and bush on the slopes, but some are against it on the grounds that it will change the area. Tosh- it looks really dreadful.


One of the reasons we came here was to travel the wilderness railway, advertised as one of the great rail journeys of the world. Rack and pinion, it travels 35 kms, is over 100 years old and has a number of trestle bridges. It takes half a day to get from Strahan on the coast to Queenstown, and is powered by steam. Or so we were told. When we got here we discovered that only half of one way is steam, the rest is by diesel and dare I say it- return by bus!!!! No way- that wasn't what we came here for!.

Anyway, having made it to Strahan, it is quite a nice place, except that the campsite is so crowded I have to keep my elbows in while I am typing. Founded as a port for the mining of Queenstown, it has a large naturally protected harbour. We had great fish and chips in the town, and enjoyed a walk along the esplanade. It's a bit cooler here on the west coast, so its the thick pyjamas tonight!

A couple more cheats, a western Quoll and a Tassie devil, both stuffed in a museum, but what the hell....