Category: tasmania

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Quaile Falls 2017 Mar


Every time we drove to Cradle Mountain and saw the old wooden sign attached to a tree saying Quaile Falls, I wanted to see what they looked like, and yet, every time, I was repelled by the other, much bigger and louder sign, there in its red and white starkness, announcing that this was Private, and that I should Keep Out. In addition, we were always either in a rush to get to the mountain, or equally anxious to get back home. Quaile Falls didn’t get a look in. Besides, how much time did one need to do this trip? Did one go right past the indignant owner’s house? What lay in store if one went down that road?


Upper Quaile Falls, encountered after fifteen minutes’ walking.
My curiosity was further ignited by the knowledge that a few friends had recently been there, and I felt it was time to find out how things lay. However, I had long since realised that a “we’re-passing-by-so-we’ll-just-call-in” kind of trip wasn’t going to happen. These falls required their own dedicated journey. And so, last week we set out to visit them in their own right, unaccompanied by any other purpose.
I retrieved how-to-get-there information from the Waterfalls of Tasmania website and off we set. The alluring sign that had attracted me for so many years was gone, but the dirt road remained, on the map northish from the falls themselves (and before the turnoff to Cradle), and leading down to near where the falls are. According to the web, there would be a small parking area (correct) with a sign pointing in the direction  of the falls, and pink tapes to set us on our way (all correct).


Olivia Creek
From the main Cradle Mountain Road (C13), looking south in the direction of the falls, you would never believe that such lovely myrtle forest was so close at hand. It looks quite barren and dry from the road. The track through the forest felt ancient. I guess it wasn’t private-keep-out in some bygone days of greater generosity; no doubt, before our legal system decided that if I fell on your land it was all your fault for owning it, and not mine for being careless. I can hardly blame the owners for trying to keep us out in the current state of affairs. I would too.


Actual Quaile Falls
As my source said, it was fifteen minutes to where I could first hear the Olivia Creek, and just beyond a creek junction to my right, lay the Upper Quaile Falls, which I actually found to be more attractive than the real ones, which, to be sure, have a huge drop, but the latter are a rather unadorned straight line, and at present, have quite a lot of debris at the bottom. The actual Quaile Falls were a further fifteen minutes from the Upper ones.


The top of the falls was a beautiful forest with gurgling, clear stream cascading over rocks and making lovely pools. I parked my husband there and said I’d be thirty minutes, planning to climb down the cliffs to the bottom. Thirty minutes was a gross underestimation. There was no pad that I could find leading to the base, so I made my way down the very steep slopes, over, around and under massive amounts of fallen timber, sliding down what I hoped I could later climb up, until I got to a spot that I decided was “good enough”. I’d used up too much time doing that much. My husband would be worried. Another tier lay below. That could wait until a day that I had someone with me. That would feel nicer. I took some shots from where I was and called it quits.
We had lunch back near the car at the edge of the forest, and were home in time for me to have a run in the gorge. The trip to Quaile Falls was a great outing, but I hadn’t exactly used up a lot of energy.


(The Road name you can’t quite read is “Dove River Road”)

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Rocky Cape National Park 2017 Mar

Rocky Cape National Park 2017 Mar

So near and yet so far … it is perhaps a mini travesty that we have lived in north Tasmania for as long as we have done, and yet have never put a foot inside Rocky Cape National Park. I must say, the fact that camping is not permitted there has had a huge amount to do with our absence. I am not a day-tripper sort of person.

However, on the final morning of our Tarkine adventure (on the fifth and final day), our leader had scheduled a short visit to this spot. I was most curious to see what I had been missing out on all these years. We drove in as far as we could before a final turnoff, when we chose right, following a sign that pointed to the beach, rather than left to boat launches, a day picnic area, and other such wonders. From our parking spot, we had a lovely hour-long wander around the coast, sometimes bushbashing (there was no track here) and other times following the rocky shore. I enjoyed the little coves of turbulent water, especially as the sky was still steely grey after the rain of the previous night.

After the others had departed on the way back to Hobart, we had a quick explore of the left-hand fork that we had rejected earlier. Here, I was amazed and not entirely pleased to find houses in a national park. I can understand that if they were there first, this creates an obvious problem. I did not, however, appreciate the fact that they were there with their dogs, whilst we were not only not allowed to camp, but were not even allowed to let our car wheels go past a certain turnoff, and yet their dogs roamed the waters of the nearest beach. When is a National Park not a National Park? Perhaps here. There seemed to be a reversal of expected values. I have nothing against dogs on beaches. My dog loves beaches. But when dogs are allowed but I am restricted, now that I object to. We didn’t stay long at Rocky Cape. One day I will disobey these inconsistent instructions and camp here to see early morning light at this place.

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Balfour Track, Trowutta Arch 2017 Mar

Balfour Track and Trowutta Arch, Tarkine Day 4.


Sadly, we turned our back on the coast – but not before I’d got up in the dark and wended my way down to the ocean to capture moonset, long before the sun had risen. The shot here is a very long exposure.


To reach our goal, we headed from the coast on the road running east from Couta Rocks – the C214 – until signs directed us to our destination. The track runs parallel to the road, rejoining it after about an hour’s walking (plus any stops you might have). Our group did an out and back route, probably taking us the three hours recommended. The extra half hour in each direction beyond walking was used in taking copious photos of fungi and forest, and in snack time beside the beautiful Stephens Rivulet.


Of all the tracks we walked this trip, this one was my favourite. The path was narrow and non-invasive; the forest was lush and green with plentiful tree ferns and moss. I thought it would be way too dry and warm for fungi, and that there would not be much to photograph, but I was mistaken. The quaint, tiny ones were not yet out, but there were still plenty of others. Luckily for me, the other walkers had gone on ahead, so I was supposedly giving chase. However, I ended up rolling in dirt every ten paces or so at the discovery of each new delightful specimen. The fact that the others were ahead meant I didn’t have to feel guilty about holding anyone up. If and when all these marvellous sights stopped, I could keep my promise about giving chase, and if not, I’d just meet them on the rebound. I rolled in a little more humus and thoroughly enjoyed myself. (Map at end of this page)



In the afternoon, we visited the Trowutta Arch. The arch itself was spectacular, but the way to it quite ruined it for me. I hated the hard, wide, unnatural path that has been built that scars the landscape. The forest also appears to be most suspiciously “tidy”. If the bureaucrats who designed this have wheelchairs in mind, I am most curious to know how they intend getting such chairs down the steep drop to the actual arch. Are they going to pop in a lift? Stairs will hardly help. The only section I enjoyed was the part they haven’t yet attacked. I hope this is the only route they decide to tame and manicure for tourists. I wonder why it is assumed that visitors are incapable of walking on any surface other than the artificially even one they normally use for shopping. This is a sad reflection on our society if it is correct. It contradicts what is actually good for our brains – a little challenge – a matter pursued by the excellent Austrian architect, Hundertwasser, in his deliberate planning of crooked, uneven paths and walls in anything he designed. I seemed to be the only one in the group who felt this way, but for me, the sight and feel of that city-style pavement in what had once been pristine rainforest, completely jarred, and detracted markedly from any delight I might have felt in the beauty that was there. Significantly, with the forest so “clean”, there were no fungi to be seen. There was nothing much for them to decompose.


Balfour Track instructions: The orange road to the left with 17 beside it is the C214. As you can see, you turn right off it (if going up from the coast) and travel 700 ms to the start. After your one hour (plus stops) walking, you will reach the C214 again, where you either retrace your steps (NOT boring at all) or, if you have arranged a car shuffle, a car will return you to the start. As the forest is always new in a different direction, the former method is both easier and more enjoyable. The track itself is the dashed line that basically follows the Stephens Rivulet. The other dashed, very straight line to the right (east) is presumably a boundary of some sort.

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Tarkine West Coast 2017 Mar

Tarkine, West Coast, day 3. Mar, 2017


Quoll prints on clean, windswept sand.
At last we arrived at the coast. Although I love mountains and lush, green, mossy paths, fungi, waterfalls and streams, I had been longing for the moment when we would reach the wild west coast and I could photograph some seascapes.


I am captivated by water’s motion, and dearly love every opportunity to attempt to record it with my camera. This coast did not disappoint, although the waters were perhaps a little less frenzied than I had hoped for.


The tide was on its way out, and was rather too calm for my liking. The sky was pretty cloudless, but that’s part of what I love about real photography. You take what nature gives you and do your best with that.


The very notion of being disappointed in what was there and popping in a fake sunball, or some snow or some passing birds in photoshop, just to make your photo more interesting, to me is anathema. I love the serendipitous in nature. I am her servant and not vice versa.


I hope you have enjoyed this small selection of the beauty I witnessed on the evening of day 3 of our Tarkine trip.

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Balfour 2017 Mar

Mt Balfour, Balfour Ghost town, and Frankland River Walk.  Tarkine day 3.


After breakfast overlooking the Pieman River with its beautiful reflections at Corinna, we continued on our way north, driving for about an hour and a quarter at moderate pace to reach the foot of Mt Balfour.
This mountain was short and very, very steep – so steep I was wondering how I was going to get my husband back down it. (He has Parkinson’s disease, if you are not used to reading this blog and find that an odd comment). Some sections you had to hang onto the grass to avoid rolling the whole way back down the hill. In fact, I watched a German girl girl doing precisely that as we neared the end on the rebound. She was wearing thongs, and had nothing to keep her foot attached to her shoe, so it slid out backwards. On the way up, I clutched grass and small bushes to avoid rolling backwards, and on the descent, I used the shrubbery rather than the ballbearinged 4WD track, as did my husband. He would have had a bad accident had he tried to stay on the track. The track just goes straight up, with no mucking around.

Steep it certainly was, but, as I said, it was also short, so I only took 27 minutes to the top – but 31 down. When you take longer to descend than to climb, you know this is a really steep slope. On top, we all enjoyed a snack just for the heck of it – because you snack on a mountain, even if it was only a tiny trip up – while some members girded their loins for the feared descent.


Next on our programme was a visit to the rather eerie ghost town of Balfour. Why eerie? For me it was, as apparently there are the graves of four hundred people who died in 1912 from typhoid. The “town” itself only has a few old tin shanties, but to think of such a large number of people living and working there, all quickly dead was rather horrifying. The doctor, whose grave remains, was only thirty when he died; Sylvia was fifteen. Most of the graves are no longer visible – perhaps there was just a mass grave at the height of the epidemic. I enjoyed the leafy tunnel that constituted the bulk of this walk, although the Frankland River, wild though it well may be, was not at its most attractive in midday glare. I didn’t bother photographing it, even though I did enjoy the leisurely stroll.


That night we slept on the West Coast, and that I DID photograph – with a vengeance. So many photos did I take that I’ll give the evening of Day 3 its very own blog (posted tomorrow).