West Coast

Montezuma Falls, Tasmania’s longest drop , were impressive in their own right, but it wasn’t walking across the narrow suspension bridge which tested our nerve ……… it was the drive to reach it!

There are two ways in, park & walk around 3 hours return or the 14km 4wd track which follows an old wooden tramline route through the mountains. This track is rated ‘medium difficulty’, but we have no doubt that there were a number of sections well into the hard category. Being an old forest ‘tram’ route it is very narrow, often scraping undergrowth as we passed it & through many deep cuttings with just inches clearance either side of the vehicle. That we finished with our mirrors intact was really more luck than judgement. In the 14.2 kms there was just one place where turning around would have been possible – at a junction with another track at around 10km mark …….. so once commenced their was no choice other than commitment! Would have been good to know that before we started! 97(ish)% of the track was continuous in & out of waterholes of unknown depth. All 1st & 2nd gear low ratio driving. The other 3% consisted of steep rocky descents into & ascents out of creek beds, stuff that had I a choice I would have chickened out & avoided. With no choice it was real heart in the mouth stuff, with me trying to put on a confident face in the hope of preventing MrsTea from panic. The front e-locker was well used, & did provide a degree of needed reassurance. There was one point where we had the vehicle’s nose pointing skyward, one wheel in the air, stationary & with the rear wheels stuck in front of some large rocks we had just dropped down from. MrsTea’s desperate squeal of “diff lock’ synchronised with my own desperate stab at the dash button – it worked & got us out. That moment, without doubt made every cent we payed for the e-locker worthwhile. without it we might still be there! (Unless our first attempt at winching – the fallback position – had extricated us). All rather tougher than we had expected. Then there was the short but extra tight section of track where we had to get around a large fallen tree on one side & a drop off (long way down) on the other. MrsTea hanging out her window to see where the front wheel was & telling me half the tyre width was in clear air was another ‘moment’! We arrived at the falls having taken almost 2.5 hours to travel the 14.2kms. The return trip was achieved in a little under two hours as the unknown had become the known – a big psychological advantage.
So yep, the falls were impressive, but our brief time at them was dominated by our shaky relief in having got there, & our necessary optimistic ‘self talk’ about the return journey. As it is the experience has built confidence in my driving ability & the car’s ability. Talking to someone since, they told us of a family member having driven the route & doing significant damage to their Toyota Landcruiser. We survived it without damage. 🙂

Montezuma Falls (no pics taken during the drive in or out – too busy driving!)

We had intended to pass through Zeehan, stopping only to get a few supplies, & then continue on to the coast to find somewhere to camp, but having taken twice as long as we had anticipated getting in & out of the falls, & feeling the need for an ‘easy’ night we stopped & propped at the caravan park in Zeehan. Made use of their pressure washer to get all the mud off the car (we had left the Tvan behind – no way would towing have been possible) & luxuriated in untimed showers ourselves, before a leisurely walk around the town in the early evening. It was a weird place, like a ghost town, once prosperous but now a failing town gradually falling into disrepair. Empty houses, empty shops, no people on the streets. Streetlights on, but very few houses with any lights on. At one end of town is the FIFO/DIDO (Fly in fly out/Drive in drive out) workers camp where the local mineworkers reside with all their needs met by the company – so no need to shop in town, or use the town’s services at all. Zeehan does have an extensive museum which was recommended to us, but in the end we felt the $50 entry fee for us both was a bit to steep given that mining history (it’s main focus) is not a great interest of ours. We did however enjoy a night time visit to the ’Spray Tunnel’ a tunnel hewn through solid rock to take a steam locomotive from one of the many mines in the area. The tunnel itself was quite a feat by those who built it, but the interest today is that it is inhabited by thousands of glowworms making a walk through the tunnel like looking up at the stars. The road to the tunnel, a very narrow winding tree lined lane, reminded me of ‘Love Lane’, from the town where I grew up in, in the UK. Coincidentally Love Lane is also a home to glow worms.

A liitle rhyme from MrsTea’s arsenal of such things:

I’d like to be a glow worm
A glow worm’s never glum
It’s hard to be downhearted
When the sun shines out your bum.

Driving this ‘Aussie Love Lane’ had another welcome surprise. Another Tasmanian Devil, this time not just a brief glimpse as it ran across the road, but instead running along the road in our headlights for a few hundred metres. It had a white band around the middle of it’s jet black body. At first we thought it was a piglet, but quickly realised it had a very different gait (& no curly tail). Two sightings in two weeks of an endangered animal we had only expected to see in captivity!

The attractive part of Zeehan – but even these grand old buildings were showing signs of neglect if you looked closely.
Across the road the old pub, now closed, still provides a gathering spot for a few of the older residents.

From Zeehan we drove to the coast again, to the tiny ’shack’ settlement of Trial Harbour nestled between steep green hills & the beach, & accessed via a long steep descent on gravel road. ‘Shack’ is a bit of a misnomer. These are not draughty old tin sheds & open fireplaces, many are quite luxurious, some full time homes, some holiday houses. All off grid. No shops.No phone signal. A small no-cost campground for visitors is in quite an exposed position to the frequent ocean winds & there were notices at the campground saying that there would be resurfacing works occuring there the following morning. We decided not to stay at what is a lovely spot in a most picturesque setting , but thought we should first have a drive through the place before leaving, as well as pay a visit to the small (but packed) little local history display. This turned out to be a most serendipitous decision. After visiting the display & talking with Shirley, a long term resident & the lady responsible for putting together & maintaining the display, we were waved down by another resident David, who was not only interested in us & our travels, but offered us a place to camp along with use of his toilet & shower facilities. Trial Harbour’s beauty is equalled by the welcoming & friendly nature of it’s few residents. In addition to offering somewhere to stay, David first took me fishing, he caught a salmon, I caught nothing, he gave us the salmon. Later he lent us his quad bike to explore a bit further afield, & we very much enjoyed riding along the beach to the Little Henty River estuary. That someone would do this for folk he’s never met is generosity we just would never have expected. But David is not alone, this sort of Tasmanian friendliness must be ‘concentrated’ in Trial Bay. Pam invited us into her home for coffee & a chat, & another chap we met on the beach (& who’s name I’ve unfortunately forgotten), after a brief discussion about fishing at Trial Bay, insisted on giving me with a complete ‘shark rig’ to use with my surf rod. ‘Fred’ (Pam’s Border Collie) & Minke a black four legged bundle of labrador cross fun both adopted us as temporary friends too. Having folk waving & calling out G’day was the norm here. It is easy to imagine that such little places are the domain of those who might prefer to simply keep it to themselves, but in Trial Bay it seemed quite the opposite. As I write this we are still in ‘Trial’ (as the residents call it) but leaving tomorrow morning. We have given up the notion of leaving the west coast for Christmas, & are off down to Strahan for supplies & expecting to camp at Macquarie Heads.

Trial Bay
David’s ‘Shack’ with us camped on his front lawn.
Also available as an AirBnB stay – we have no doubt you would be extremely well looked after.
At low tide we explored rock pools & later enjoyed the ‘action’ of the incoming tide.
Pacific Gull. Scrambling up some rocks enabled me to get reasonably close.
A west coast sunset at Trial Bay
‘Yours Truly’ on the quad bike generously lent to us
And ‘Yours Truly’ having yet another unsuccessful fishing attempt.
Little Henty River estuary

Strahan was a place we had built up in our minds as ’special’ & we had been looking forward to our visit. Somehow, despite failing to live up to our expectations & offering only one small shop to obtain supplies from & no fresh fish available off the boats as we had hoped for (bad weather had meant no fishing trips recently), it impressed us as a town with unexploited potential. It sits in a prime position at the top of an enormous natural harbour, alongside extensive world heritage listed forests. There was a small ’tourism hub’, but aside from selling tickets for expensive steam train rides or boat cruises into the forests it offered us little else. To be fair those excursions may well be good value to either steam train enthusiasts and/or folk without any other means of accessing the wilderness areas, but for us we have a vehicle suitable for taking us into the forest, to places we can walk & experience the bush at our leisure. We (well I) may have been keener to experience the rail trip if the cost had been less, but the choice of half day or full day for between $250 & $600 for us both was hard to justify given that is around our fortnightly budget! However we did stock up with supplies & we did enjoy spending some time in the lovely forest timbers mill, workshop & shop. The latter have the sole rights to the worlds only supply of Huon Pine timber, much of it many of years old & salvaged from the waters of flooded valleys when hydro electric power generation was introduced several decades ago. Huon Pine smells wonderful & the workshop was an olfactory delight. Properly worked, the timber is a visual joy, but as an ever diminishing resource it carries a hefty price. $10,000 for a coffee table! A very nice one …. but strewth! The shop carried pieces like this, but probably sell many more of their large number of ‘knick knacks’ to folk who just want to pay to own a piece of Huon Pine along with the embossed Huon Pine label. For the woodworker a variety of sawn timber & offcuts was available & even wood shavings bagged up from the workshop were claimed to be useful in deterring moths from your wardrobe. Nothing is wasted! Huon pine has a reputation for durability too. The one item I would have been interested in buying was unfortunately not for sale …. a chopping board used by 3 generations of the same family & still in eminently useable condition.

The quay side Huon Pine Mill (the main mill is in Queenstown)
I found the rustic/nostalgic displays attractive.
Looks like a pile of firewood, but this Huon Pine ‘driftwood’ would make for exceptionally expensive fuel!

Our highlight in Strahan was a visit to the Parks & Wildlife office & meeting Reece, an enthusiastic & very knowledgeable young man who was a joy to speak to. I doubt he had he been born during the time of the Franklin blockade but nevertheless his reverence & appreciation for what was Australia’s, (& perhaps the world’s) most organised & successful environmental protest (to prevent the damming & flooding of priceless wilderness valleys – see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Dam_controversy  &  https://www.wilderness.org.au/history-franklin-river-campaign-1976-83 was impressive. It would have been hard for him not to have been thus, given that he works daily within the building which back in the day had been the headquarters for the protest. It was here the ‘No Dams’ stencils had been made, the helicopter supplies for the protesters living in the forest (accessible only by air or boat) were organised & the fund raising to make it all possible initiated. Meeting & talking to Reece made us feel that as well as the protest having prevailed & prevented the loss of what is now a World Heritage Listed area, that our (all of us) environmental future whilst bleak in so many ways across the planet, is just that little bit more optimistic knowing that the flame that burned back in the 70’s still burns today.

From Strahan we drove south to Macquarie Heads (‘The Heads’). This is the piece of land on one side of the very narrow channel through which the water flows in & out of the huge Macquarie Harbour (we’re talking the size of an English county). This channel is no more than a few hundred metres, restricting the ocean tides from having an appreciable effect upon the harbour’s water height. Nevertheless during my numerous hours of unsuccessful fishing attempts from a jetty a short distance inside the heads I observed rapid water movement at times & still water at others, neither of which appeared to be predictable either in when the movement would occur, nor the direction it would move in. We camped at the ‘Heads’ for a couple of nights, where despite the constant wind & on/off drizzly rain, which seems to be the norm on the West Coast, we were sheltered from the worst of it amongst bush & on nice grassy sites which we shared with numerous Pademelons. At $7 per night per vehicle it was good value. A long walk ‘around the corner’ on Ocean Beach was ‘bracing’ with a view of rolling surf & sand dunes as far as the eye could see. One step saw us ‘blown away’ (figuratively speaking & almost literally). One moment no wind, next moment ‘hold on to your hat’!

Camped at Macquarie Heads. “My facial response to MrsTea suggesting my fishing may be less than productive! (She was of course correct as it turned out)
Ocean Beach at Macquarie Heads – stretches much further than the eye can see, & we were the only people there.

From information provided by one of this blog’s readers (thanks Jan) & expanded upon by Reece in Strahan a hike along the Bird River, along a now overgrown old rail track to the site of Pillinger, once a port on the south eastern banks of Macquarie Harbour, in one of the many bays, this one known as the Kelly Basin, interested us. The township was once home to 1000 people back in the late 19th & early 20th centuries, it’s last inhabitants having left there in 1945 & the last train travelled it’s narrow tracks in 1925. Large trees & treeferns now grow where steel tracks once lay & land slips have made what once was levelled into hills to be climbed along the path we followed. Moss & vegetation covered everything. This walk which took us around 5 hours to complete primarily gave us access to the ‘outskirts’ of the World Heritage Franklin Gordon Wild Rivers region but with the added interest of seeing occasional remnants of previous human occupation amongst the forces of nature which has resolutely re-established it’s timeless equilibrium. An occasional steel rail track poking out from the myriad of moss encrusted tree roots , & in the ’township’ itself the rotting timber skeleton of an old railway carriage, no longer filled with plush seats & brass fittings. Again a few steel tracks leading to the row of stumps stretching out into the water where once the train had taken cargoes of bricks out to ships. Pillinger was a brick making centre but now the forest is slowly taking back the brick kilns which once boasted tall chimneys, today the structures are crumbling ruins coated in green & hidden among tall trees. It rained, & it rained. We were soaked to the skin from above, soaked from constantly pushing through the wet undergrowth, & from walking on a surface which varied between an uneven maze of tree roots & running streams of water………..but it wasn’t cold & in fact whilst physically exhausting it seemed to nurture us inside. Forests do that!

Between Queenstown & Bird River
Driving in to the start of the Bird River track (through an old railway cutting)
Bird River (Photos taken with the ‘point & shoot’ camera – easier to slip into a pocket when walking through  the very wet environment)
Posing in the rain
One of the easier sections of the track

Fungi
More fungi- we christened this one ‘cow pat fungi’
Ruins of one of the old brick kilns. MrsTea commented that people would pay a lot of money to have their gardens looking like this!
The forest is reclaiming it.
One of two old marine steam boilers found among the undergrowth – once used to power the brick presses & saws.
BIG nuts & bolts use in the steam boiler construction.
Remnants of a once luxurious railway carriage
Steel rail lines still sit on the shore in front of the remains of the old jetty along which they used to take the bricks out onto ships.

Our camping experience in the forest, in what was essentially a gravel pit, & the furthest we could take our car & camper was an experience! Upon our arrival, during a brief period of sunny weather & before we had a chance to exit the car, we drew the interest of bees, not just a handful, many hundreds of them crawling all over our car, across the windscreen & windows. Not especially inviting for MrsTea who has a near phobic fear of wasps & found the overwhelming numbers of bees at such close quarters somewhat more than a little anxiety producing. Nevertheless her courage & stoicism shone through & we exited the car & braved the swarm once we realised a) they weren’t going away & b) there was another car parked there to which the bees were paying no attention. We (I) reasoned that it was most likely the noise or vibration of our car’s running motor which was of interest to them & with crossed fingers cautiously stepped out into the swarm. They were all around us, landing on our hats but displaying no aggression. MrsTea followed my suggestion to ’show no fear which may be interpreted by the bees as aggression’. Thankfully after 30 minutes or so they lost interest in us & our car. Later when the owners of the other car returned from their hike they recounted a similar story & also believed that it was the running motor which had attracted them. There are hives placed around the area for bees to make honey from the abundant Leatherwood blossom. Leathewood honey is a Tasmanian specialty.
The sunny weather soon changed to sporadic drizzle which then changed to 24 hours of torrential downpour. ‘Wet’ is an understatement. At it’s height one of the tent door zips stuffed up & believe me, when a canvas door is all you have between you & such weather being unable to close it fully is no small deal …………. but we survived, managed to fix the zip the following day & decided to head away from the coast & the weather to hopefully dry out over Christmas.

‘Our’ gravel pit had been around 25kms south of Queenstown, another small town, although the largest of the few towns on the west coast. Another mining town. Approaching it from Strahan we had found Queenstown nestled at the feet of the mountains towering around it. The only ways in are down! Large mountain sides devoid of vegetation could be seen, but the almost iconic view of the snake like hairpin road aproaching the town from the west were not seen. We may later return from the west just for that. Essentially one main street with a couple of locally owned supermarkets (IGA) & a few shops including a butcher. We have determined that the presence or otherwise of a butcher shop in a town says much about the ‘health & viability’ of the community. We stopped briefly again in Queenstown for a little ‘internetting’ on our way toward what we hoped might be some kinder weather. We left behind the torrential rain, & spent the rest of the day in what in our limited experience is typical Tassie weather. The saying in Melbourne is that it gets 4 seasons in one day. Our experience here is that 4 seasons in half an hour is common & that is no exaggeration!

Queenstown
Main street pub, Queenstown.

Our route to Tullah took us on the ‘back road’ past Lake Plimsol & the Murchison dam & through striking treeless glacial mountains, very different to the forest coated mountains we have become accustomed to. Of course no change in the constant switchback nature of the steep roads. We estimate that 60% of our driving on sealed roads is in 3rd gear, 20% in 2nd gear 18% in 4th gear & 2% in 1st gear. Everyone told us that in Tassie you never have to drive far between places. That’s true, but it excludes the fact that ’short’ distances can often take a long time when crawling up & down the sides of mountains! It’s not for no reason that road signs give driving times as well as distance. Hwever the signs seem to assume an average speed of 60kph – for us 40kph is probably more realistic when long second gear climbs & equally long & slow descents are the norm. This morning I wanted to check the car’s oil level & drove several kilometres tring to find a level spot to park, but was unable to find one , save for a single lane bridge crossing the valley in which we are camped! “It’s Christmas day” I reasoned “ there won’t be much traffic on this out of the way country road” So I stopped mid bridge, raised the bonnet & pulled out the dipstick. By the time I’d wiped the bloody thing I had a queue of 3 cars waiting at the end of the bridge for me to finish, & another who drove up & stopped just behind me! I grinned sheepishly, waved & mouthed ‘Merry Christmas’ whilst completing my task hurriedly before vacating the right of way. We have yet to discover if the rest of Tasmania is as mountainous as the North West.

How to confuse a motorcyclist! Snapped between Queenstown & Tullah.
Mountains without forest cover – also between Queenstown & Tullah

Occasionally when driving we pull over to allow faster traffic than us to pass. Traffic is not very dense & thus this only occurs a few times each day. Mostly folk usually give a wave or a toot of the horn in appreciation as they pass. Somewhere we pulled up behind another car stopped at some lights where roadwork was being undertaken. The occupant of the car, a middle aged lady got out of her car & briskly approached us in a manner making me think she was going to complain. I wondered if it was because I had not pulled over to let her pass sooner a short time earlier. I couldn’t have been more wrong. She ‘gushed’ with appreciation, told us her life story, thanked us for visiting ‘her’ island & wished us a merry christmas all in the space of the time it took the red light to go green. If I’d leaned out of my window I’m sure she’d have hugged & kissed me. 🙂

Christmas. Here I sit, believe it or not, in weather which has been consistently sunny all day & with just the lightest of breezes! The best weather we have seen since stepping off the ferry. Perfect!

Our Christmas location, set a few metres back in the trees, alongside the Mersey River. Trees came right to the water’s edge until recent floods brought all these boulders down in one major event.

Yesterday, Christmas Eve, we pushed on northward, through drizzle & rain, over the sub alpine plateau with small rivers running through plains of hardy grass loved by cattle graziers, all surrounding Cradle Mountain. We bypassed Cradle Mountain itself, leaving it for another time later in the summer, in our quest to find somewhere warm & dry for Christmas Day. Up there the weather felt icy, like it could snow at any minute.

We did conduct some research (& received advice) into finding a place to stay for Christmas where we might be able to camp within walking distance from an establishment putting on a Christmas lunch, but surprisingly such places were few & far between. We had however thought to go to the southern town, in the Huon Valley below Hobart, of Geeveston where the Returned Servicemens Club apparently put on an excellent spread for any travellers who let them know they are coming, & at no cost apparently! However as it turned out, it wasn’t convenient to head down that way given our location & need to be in the north to house sit for friends the day after boxing day. So instead we decided not to have Christmas this year. No ‘bah humbug’ etc. Just make it ‘another day on the road’. And so here we are in a very pleasant & dry (woohoo!) forest camp site alongside a crystal clear boulder lined creek in the Mole Creek Karst National Park. Whilst you have been tucking into your christmas roasts, cold meats, prawns, pavlovas & trifles we have started our day with fruit salad & toast, had sausages for lunch & are looking forward to one of our favourite ‘regulars’ of tofu & eggplant curry for dinner. No pressies, no tinsel, but lots of trees. A couple of Al’s ’specials’ will wash the curry down nicely. What has surprised us, in a place we thought we would have to ourselves is all the others doing similar to us. We’ll relax here for another couple of nights before continuing on to see our friends, where we will again have internet access so I can post this to you. So Christmas will be over by the time you read this, but please accept our belated Christmas wishes & hopes that for you 2018 will be a year that opens doors to a dream or two.

XXXX

9 thoughts on “West Coast

  1. Fond memories of Trial and Granville staying there in shacks or camping.

    Mole Creek and Queenie – my fathers stomping grounds but with 35 years between them.

    You are doing well on your travels finding all the hidden gems.

  2. Pleased to read you managed the Pillinger walk.
    If you do go back down that way, I think you would find the Mt Mc Call drive worth doing – and nowhere near as hair raising as the Montezuma Falls drive! (which we chickened out of!)

    1. Hi Wendy, we did have the Mt McCall track recommended to us & would like to have done it. However you need to get the key to the gate from Parks & Wildlife & return it the same day. Problem was that they were all taking off for the Xmas period about an hour after we were in the office. If we return to the Queenstown area I think we’ll give it another try.

  3. We spent last Xmas Day (2016) at Branxholm and the temperature was in the mid to high 30’s. Branxholm is NE from Launceston so that indicates how different the weather is from west to east.
    Did you know Greenies live in houses made from timber taken out of heritage areas; not mud brick as one would expect.
    Don’t miss seeing “The Wall” at Derwent Bridge; it is all Huon Pine.

  4. G`Day Cuppa and Mrs Tea.
    Ah the memories, and I`ve only been back a couple of months. great write up mate, and the paintings awesome. Sorry you didn`t do the musuem, as it`s a pass For 4or 5 days and you defiantly need all day to see it. So much to see so little time hey. Safe travels guy`s .

    1. Hiya Pearcey, they might’ve changed the length of the museum pass’ validity. We were told it was for just one day. But yes, so much to see. We realised in the first week that 14 weeks wasn’t going to be long enough & there is so much we’ve passed by already …… leaving it for next time!.

  5. Hi Tea Family, another great yarn but this one was more likely to put us off venturing down to Tassie.

    Hope you had an enjoyable Christmas and celebrate the new year wildly

    James & Pauline

    1. Don’t let anything I write put you off! If you have rain forest, ya gotta have rain! It’s nice to now be in drier & warmer weather, but we loved the ‘wild’ west.

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