Tassie Tour: Day 6

Launceston to Cradle Mountain - 202km

We left the big city in the morning and headed back out west into the Western Tiers (that's mountains to the rest of us). As we rose in altitude the mercury in our thermometers declined, dropping to a chilly 7°C at one point. We were really not prepared for the cold. We took a brisk stoll through the fern forests to see the 4 tiered Liffey Falls before heading over to Pine Lake, one of the few places in the world where you can see the hardy Pencil Pine tree. We didn't stay long as the cold, wind and rain started to get to us.

We stopped by Deloraine to see their Sculpture tour Riverside walk, a sleepy little town that is trying to encourage tourism, it doesn't seem to be going to well yet but it was worth a stop. A short lunch and the Van Diemens Land Creamery, a Tasmania institution known for its Ice Cream. The sun popped out for a few minutes so we figured we should give it a try.

After lunch we continued west into the foothills of Cradle Mountain to meet some Tasmanian devils and Quolls. We wanted to learn a bit more about this animal so famously known but for what? Here are a few facts that could surprise you:
- it has the strongest bite of all carnivorous marsupials
- it takes his name from the sound that he makes (check out the video!) and the fact that his ears go red from blood circulation to help him cool down
- all his fat goes into his tail, so if you want to know if he is in good health, don't look at his belly look at his tail!
We also saw some quolls, an animal that we were not familiar with before the tour! They are very cute, but same as the Tasmanian devil you may want to watch your fingers when close as they have pretty good teath!

Finally we headed to our wood fired nature hut in the wilderness. As we are staying on the mountain it gets quite cold at night so the fire is roaring and the extra blankets are out. Equipped with most of the mod cons we were able to do our first home cooked meal in 3 months, nothing fancy but just what we needed on a cold night in the mountain.Read more