Cradle Mountain Walks

We woke to a freezing morning, I was expecting my watch to say 5am but it was 7! I'd bought oats yesterday so at least we could have a hot breakfast before starting out.

By the time we got to Ronny Creek on the shuttle it was 10am and we headed up the track for Marions Lookout 1223m. There was quite a bit of ice around so you really had to watch your step, it took us about an hour to get up there, even with the stops for photos. We met a young girl who was doing a circuit track around to Kitchens hut along and back down to Dove lake via Lake Wilks, so we figured we'd give that a go seeing that the day was clear and we had brought sandwiches with us.

The going was a little harder from this point with quite a bit of snow and ice along the track, thick in places and you really had to watch your step, with legs as short as mine it was impossible to keep up with Bart! He was gone!

We stopped at Kitchens hut for some lunch and then continued on around the face of Cradle Mountain and Smithies Peak. It was so beautiful walking right next to these amazing rock formations, though you had to stop if you wanted to look at them, otherwise you'd end up on your butt!

We continued on till we got to the link track down to Lake Wilks. This was super steep and sketchy. Very interesting when you had your jacket tied around your waist and you didn't want to get it wet in the water or snow! But you had to almost sit down to reach down to the next foothold!

Once you get down to Dove lake you've got boardwalk the rest of the way which was so nice. We stopped and I asked a couple to take a photo of us in front of the boat house, seeing we'd had one taken there back in 2005. Before heading back up to get the shuttle back to the information centre.

Such a lovely day, so glad we changed our direction of travel and headed across to Cradle Mountain, the coast is lovely but I'm an alpine mountains girl at heart ❤️Read more