Farewell to Van Diemen's Land

Well, six weeks isn't a very long time, is it!  I can't believe that I'm due on the ferry to go home today and that my time here in Tasmania is at an end.  Ah well, there's still so much to see that I'll just have to start planning the next trip here.

The evening light on paperbarks, Low Head

I decided to explore the Tamar Valley, thinking food, wine, galleries and some serious chilling, but instead found the Tamar Island wetlands centre.  There was a lovely walk over the wetlands to the Tamar Island.  The area was very marshy, with reeds and mud everywhere, as well as A LOT of snakes.  

This rather pretty copperhead was sunning itself about a metre away from a sign explaining how there were snakes in the area.  I thought it was fake until it yawned!

And then there were these two ... what were they doing?!?!

And this is why they are called copperheads, I guess.  It sounds so much better than coppertummys.

In Launceston (or Lonnie if I wanted to sound like a local), there was an amazing gallery of blown glass.  The pieces involved incredibly complicated patterns and yet were glorious in the simplicity of their shape and style.  Unfortunately, my rather austere budget does not allow me to buy such works of art.

Beautiful and delicate ... this was my favourite

Leaving the big smoke, I wandered back to the north, visiting Deloraine again (I really could live there) as well as some art/craft galleries along the way.  And I ended up in Mole Creek.  Now, someone had defaced the sign so that it looked like Wolf Creek but that didn't deter me and instead I found one of the gems of my trip.

The Mole Creek hotel was a bit OTT with Tasmanian tigers everywhere!  Evidently, the owners of the pub saw a tiger about twenty years ago ... and a lot of locals have also seen the (perhaps not extinct) marsupial around the little town.  It's certainly doing no harm to the tourist trade.

I walked out to the Alum Cliffs which had some lovely views and then went to see if the caravan park had room for me.  Well, I struck gold yet again.  The park was booked out but the lovely owners found me a site (I called it Site 0) with my own covered benches, a creek, firepit and even power.  The creek had trout in it (and an elusive platypus) and then I discovered Merran and Warren were coming there in a day or so.  How good was this!

Maggie loved this caravan park.  OK, it had water and grass but the real attraction was initially Clyde.  Clyde was an entire male heeler who Maggie thought was the new love of her life.  That was until Glen, the owner, started driving around in his ride-on mower, delivering wood to campsites.  So she rounded him up for a time, much to everyone's amusement.  And then she found the sheep!  Bliss!

Warren, Merran and I went up to Devil's Gullet, a rather steep drive up, up and up, before a short walk out to a lookout.  The views were incredible!  Cradle Mountain, Mt Ossa, the whole Overland Track laid out in front of us on a beautifully clear day.  The lookout itself was terrifying ... it jutted out over nothing.  I thought I was incredibly brave to even go out this far (Maggie the therapy dog helped!).

I know, I know.  The sign says no dogs (or cats ... go figure! Who takes their cat for walkies in the bush?) but when we put Maggie in the back of Warren's car she cried and cried.

I left Mole Creek quite reluctantly.  With only a few days before the ferry, I decided to give Maggie some quality time at the beach and explore some of the other campsites that I hadn't yet visited.  I went to Greens Beach which was a delight - long sandy beaches and a shallow bay.  I camped under some enormous pine trees where I was entertained by the black cockatoos that were eating their way through the pine cones.

Leaving Greens Beach, I decided to go to Turners Beach and here is where everything almost came unstuck ... literally and figuratively!  Lady Google Maps said turn right onto C741 and so I did.  C741 quickly became a dirt road and I did wonder if I should turn around and take the longer route, but the road had a good surface so on I went.  BIG mistake!  The corrugations started soon after that and then the road began to climb ... steeply!  I went down into third gear, then second, bouncing all over the road.  Then road became REALLY steep and I was in first gear (still bouncing all over the corrugations) and I realised that if I stalled I was in serious trouble.  That if I met one of the possible logging trucks, I was in SERIOUS trouble.  That if I stalled when I met one of the logging trucks, I was in REALLY SERIOUS TROUBLE.  Often, when you read a thriller they talk about "breaking out in a cold sweat".  I've always wondered was that really a possible thing ... it is!  Anyway, as you can tell, Van Morrison came through like a champion!  He climbed the mountain, crawled down the other side (second gear, bouncing all over the place) and got me to Turners Beach (big disappointment - no sand and rough seas).  NEVER trust Google Maps.

A PS to this story is that I warned Merran about the now infamous C741 and she thinks it's the same road that Google Maps took them over when they got off the ferry.  In the dark!  With a caravan!  Aaahh!

So this is the end of the trip - I'm sitting here in the caravan park at Devonport, waiting for boarding time.  Maggie is going to travel in the van this time (I couldn't face putting her in those cages again) and I am going to enjoy a drink or two on the deck.  It has been a delightful six weeks and I'm very sorry it's finished ... can't wait to get on the road again!