Tag: Waterfalls of Tasmania

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Narrawa Creek Falls 2018 Apr

Narrawa Creek Falls 2018 Apr
Today I had a total waterfall spree, just going with the flow (ha ha) and visiting the next falls that my eyes caught on the map. I had no internet connection, being in the middle of nowhere, so no information. For each one (apart from my revisit to Phillips Falls), it was a case of park the car where it seemed reasonable, and try to get there. I am pleased to report success in each case. (The other four in the collection, which will get their own blogs, are: Cethana Falls, Hullabaloo Falls, Hullabaloo Upper, and Hogg Creek Falls).
I was actually heading for Cradle Mountain, but got so waylaid that I never even got near. My first stop was to revisit Phillips Falls near the Mt Claude saddle, as it had not been flowing last time I was there, and I had hopes that, after yesterday’s rain, there might be something to photograph this time. There was, so I have done another Phillips Falls blog. See
www,natureloverswalks.com/phillips-falls-2/

Narrawa Creek Falls pumping it out.
Second on my list, once I rejoined Cethana Road and began to climb after the bridge below the dam wall at the bottom, was the still unfortunately unspectacular Cethana Falls at the second hairpin bend on the climb. (Separate, very short blog with a map in case you need it – see www.natureloverswalks.com/cethana-falls/). And now came the challenge. Narrawa Creek Gorge. On inspecting the map, I saw a dirt road issuing from one of the hairpins that you could follow that went sort of nearby. I sought it out. It had a huge, no-arguments-will-be-entertained fence that, well, I could have climbed, but I decided they meant business, so resisted and had another map stare. OK. Let’s try from above, which would involve a fairly whopping height loss (to be regained on the homeward journey, but, hey, I’ve got all day and I enjoy exercise , so why not?).

Armillaria novaezelandiae
I exited the main, sealed Cradle Road on the dirt road that leads to Lemonthyme Lodge, and parked my car along it where a track leads down the hill, as per the map below. Would this one have a fence or a keep out sign? No. Excellent. Narrawa, here I come. Down, down, down I dropped on a route that is only for the enthusiastic. It was so steep that my boots had trouble not slipping on occasion. What I was on was a former dirt road, but there were no signs at all of recent (or even non-recent) usage. It was weathered into a state of definite disrepair that would challenge even a quad bike. It was totally fine for walking. Fungi as well as curiosity kept me highly motivated. At my chosen moment, I deserted this and went bush in quest of my falls, fearing all along after last weekend’s failed attempt at Cashs that I would just meet with cliffs and buttresses that hid me from my goal. As I got nearer, I could hear its mighty roar, so wondered: if you hear it, can that count as a bag? I knew the answer was “No”. Wow, though, it was sure pumping.

And, was I ever excited when I got my first glimpse. wow, what a mighty wallop of water to go with the noise. It was momentous. I perched on a somewhat precarious ledge to photograph my prize before returning, very satisfied to the car. I decided that that effort deserved lunch, so had a picnic in the bush right there.
Just as I was leaving, and consulting my map to sort out what I wanted to do next, a little piece of writing caught my eye: it said “Hullabaloo Falls”. It wasn’t far away – just down the road, near Lemonthyme Lodge.  It would be stupid to ignore being this close, so off I set. For continuation of this story, you will need to progress to www.natureloverswalks.com/hullabaloo-falls/.

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Phillips Falls (ii) 2018 Apr

Phillips Falls (ii) 2018 Apr
As you may well have noted, my previous blog on Philllips Falls had no photo of the actual falls – as nothing was falling. I decided to go to Cradle Mountain yesterday, and to revisit these falls on the way in the hope that Thursday’s rain would have had a positive effect on the falls.


This time there was water, so here are some shots. Take the C138 over the Claude Mt side ridge, and after you’ve descended, the first road (which is dirt) on your right. Stop at the bridge over Mechanical Creek (not signed). The road divides in two here. About 40 metres back in the incoming direction (SE), you’ll see a pink tape. The tapes lead to the base. (See route map below)


Looking downstream
As it so turned out, I got so involved in the process of visiting the next falls that caught my attention, and the next and the next, ad almost infinitum, that I never made it to Cradle, but did “bag” six falls, five of which were new for me. It was a successful and a fun outing. I have in retrospect dubbed it the Sheffield Waterfall Circuit. The six falls, in case you want to do a similar circuit, were: Phillips, Cethana, Narrawa, Hullabaloo, Hullabaloo Upper and Hoggs Creek Falls. If you want to mimic my route exactly, then you’ll also need to stop at Fudge ‘n’ Good Coffee in Sheffield for Italian Coffee and sweet treats at the end of the circle. The excellent cappuccino I had there kept me alive for the drive back to Launceston after a fairly full day.

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Harridge Falls 2018 Apr

Harridge Falls Apr 2018


Harridge Falls, tacked onto the end of our Cashs Falls mission, were a kind of consolation prize: at least I wouldn’t go home totally empty handed from our expedition. Craig kindly drove the extra distance to enable this.


As we both believe that bushwalking is best combined with coffee drinking and cake eating, we stopped at Crank It Cafe in Derby on our way through. In both directions passing through Derby, cycling-gear clad people of all ages were drinking coffee, coming in or out of the supermarket or parking their bikes preparatory to doing the above. The place seemed abustle with cyclists, which is fabulous to see. What a wonderful use of our glorious rainforest.


The Harridge Falls walk was only very short, but that doesn’t matter: we’d had our exercise at Cashs. The flow was not full strength, but, as Craig pointed out, that gave us more freedom to go places that would be covered were the volume of water its winter fullness. Even so, I was very wary of the sloping granite. I was more worried about my camera equipment than my body, but the effect is the same in deterring too many adventurous leaps.


As with Cashs Falls, the fungi were starting to appear for the autumn, and provided colour and interest to the forest floor. Unfortunately, passing motorists had tossed a variety of debris out their car windows, so the first few metres of the bush were less attractive than they should be, but once you were out of throwing range of cars, you were into a glorious place. Little wonder that the father of the Australian conservation movement, Miles Dunphy, hated touring motorists.
(See www.natureloverswalks.com/cashs-falls/ )


“Context statement”: Coming from the west, drive through Derby. Turn south to Weldborough on the continuation of the Tasman Highway, A3. Cross the Ringarooma River and start paying attention. When that series of sub curves is at its most easterly point, and where there is a four-wheel-drive track going into the bush, come to a screaming halt. You have arrived, and need to park where the dirt track provides some room. Overshoot, and you’ll have a longish drive before you can turn around. The pad to the falls is visible to the left of the 4WD track, and has some ribbons.

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Shower Falls, Camp Falls 2018 TAS Peninsula Apr

Shower Falls and Camp Falls, TAS Peninsula, Apr 2018


My family had hired a shack at Eaglehawk Neck on the Tas Peninsula for Easter, so I decided to use my close proximity to the Shower and Camp Falls to do a quick bag. I set my alarm for 6 a.m. to catch sunrise on my way (plenty of time, as sunrise was not until 7.17, so I thought), and fell happily asleep. Trouble was, my relatives had mislead me and I hadn’t double-checked. I awoke to a sky already pink (it was supposed to be black at that hour): daylight savings had begun in the morning, and not in the evening as they maintained. Of course, it is my fault too for not doing my own investigation on when the clocks changed. Meanwhile, I had all but missed dawn. Pity, as it was a nice one.


As you can see, I did at least catch the tail end of it, but had to use the huge railings as a tripod, as I didn’t have time to set up. The railings make my life rather tricky, actually, as they are so tall that when my camera is resting on them, I can’t see through the eyepiece: it’s too high. My camera doesn’t fit in the narrow strips between rails that they allow. In order to get a good photo, I need to actually climb over the railings, which I didn’t have time for on this morning. (I did the next day). They say they are interested in safety. It would actually be a lot safer if their railings were not so high so that those who want to see don’t have to climb to be able to do so. Don’t scoff you men until you’ve tried feeling what it’s like to be forced to look at nature from behind wretched bars.


Anyway, dawn duly photographed, I set off to find my waterfalls. I really hated the highway I now had to walk on in order to reach Waterfall Bay. It was wide, smooth, glary, manicured, totally unnatural and utterly boring. My feet dragged with the monotony of the smoothed-out, unchallenging surface. I felt like Shakespeare’s reluctant schoolboy drudging his way to the day’s orchestrated boredom. Twenty minutes later, I was at Waterfall Bay carpark. Oh joy and bliss. Here they haven’t “improved” on nature, and I was allowed to walk on an appealing narrow, unpredictable dirt path. No doubt they have plans to ruin it at some future date, and call that ruination “improvement”. On this little path, you could actually get to the edge and peep over if you wanted to. You got to think about where you placed your feet instead of going into robot mode, a brain-dead automaton. This section, alas, only lasted fifteen minutes, but it was a relief after the wide cousin that preceded it.


Shower Falls
“Camp Creek”, as I have dubbed it (nameless on my map), was running, so I knew I would get something at the falls. As there was a nice little track leading to the lower Shower Falls, I took it first and photographed them before heading upstream to Camp Falls, which were just a tiny bit lower than the track.


Shower Falls
I definitely preferred Shower Falls. The way back was just a reversal of the way out, except that it was, for me, full of guilt, as I had taken longer than anticipated, and I knew the children would be eager for Easter Eggs. I was holding things up.


Camp Falls

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Sharpes Falls 2018 Apr

Sharpes Falls 31 Mar 2018.


My daughter and I had just had a glorious time climbing Mt Sprent in the South West and sleeping on the Wilmot Range, but, being greedy, I also wanted to bag a waterfall with her – to share that side of what I love – so we decided to take in Sharpes Falls, just short of the Mt Field National Park, on our way home from Strathgordon. I knew she’d love waterfall bagging in general, it’s so like orienteering – except that there’s a beautiful waterfall to greet you when you’ve navigated well, rather than an orange and white flag: hey, much more fun. As for whether she’d like Sharpes Falls in particular, I couldn’t say until we’d seen it, but you have to see it to know, so off we set.


We’d parked at the boom gate at Newbury Rd (the turn to the west beyond the National Park. If you get to Sharpes Rd, you’ve gone too far west). We assiduously ignored all the signs that told us we were embarking on a very dangerous mission (everything one does in modern Australia is very dangerous; the words have lost their sting as councils yell “danger” at the sight of a caterpillar). Up the hill we progressed, past the quarry on the right (doubtless full of life-threatening horrors) and continued on, at first through a pine plantation that made us happy by reminding us of all the orienteering events we’ve done in forest smelling just like that, and further, to an ugly felled area. Neither of us likes felled trees – although felled pines are perfectly justifiable, they’re still not pleasant to observe – so elected to turn into the forest that contained our falls earlier than planned, just to create pretty scenery for ourselves.


The going was thus slower, but that’s fine by us, as we were not on a mission of efficiency. Our intent was beauty, so we enjoyed wending our way in lush forest above the creek that contained our falls (Sharpes Creek). We even found some early fungi, and lost of lush moss to excite us. The falls were definitely worth the walk of about twenty minutes in each direction.


On the way out, we decided to go the way that most people would probably want to come if efficiency was part of their game, just to test it out for this blog. Heading straight out of the falls to the east, we came upon some orange tapes. However, if you are not comfortable navigating, do not count on these tapes, as they can not be relied upon, especially near the logged area. This is not a waterfall for tourists.