Wednesday 15^th February, 2012

The first stop came very soon. I was a few minutes too early at Tamar Island. A footbridge is leading to the island from which I could observe sea birds. After a few meters it rustled in the reed and something with a tail disappeared below the footbridge. I stopped, looked around and saw two examples of the smallest wallaby species in Tasmania. I was surprised to meet wallabies here as I was expecting for birds and snakes. I went on and saw different birds, which all fled after they heard me. It was a nice walk, but the sun was already burning at 9 o'clock. I went further to the Swiss Village Grindelwald. Yes, that is correct, the village is really called Grindelwald (to the non-Swiss: this is a tourist village in the Swiss Alps). It was founded by a Dutch which was taken with Grindelwald. He constructed here houses in Swiss style and now they are mostly used as tourist accommodations. My next destination is Beauty Point. Here is a platypus and echinda house. I wanted to visit it as I never saw a platypus live. The guide explained a lot over the platypuses and I could watch a few of them. Then the guide changed to the echindas and told us about this animals. There were tree small ones which did not fear humans so I could sit to them. As the tour was over, I went to the nearby sea horse house. Also here I learned a lot about this animals from a guided tour. It was interesting to watch how this small “horses” develop. Then there was also a gold mine in the proximity which I visited. There is an exhibition about the old mine and its miners. They also showed how 2006 the miners were locked in and how they were rescued. Over the Batman Bridge I drove to the other side of Tamar River to Low Head to visit the light house. Along vines, apple and apricot trees the voyage continued without interruption to Bridport. This village is at the sea and I enjoy the beach with a long walk.

Saturday 11^th February 2012

I enjoyed breakfast viewing two grazing wallabies. Then I took the shuttle bus until Dove Lake. There I hiked via Lake Lilla to Crater Lake. As it was not very far from Marions Lookout, I also went up there. The view over the lakes Lake Lilla, Dove Lake and Crater Lake is gorgeous. To enjoy the view I had to pass a very steep section. The steps were nearly to big for me and I had to pull myself on the steel rope. Down the same way for about 30 minutes. Then I walked down to Crater Lake and hiked further to Ronny Creek. The last part was a boardwalk and there I saw a grazing wombat.

Then I took again the shuttle bus to another stop and walked to two waterfalls. The Knyvet Falls can only been seen from the side. On the way there was also a dam constructed by platypuses. I did not see any animals as they only get out shortly before dawn.

In the afternoon it got sunny. I walked for another our on the boardwalk and enjoyed the nature. There were many lizards and I had to make sure I did not step on one. As I wanted to look for wombat in the later afternoon, I went first to the Devils at Cradle Park. There they showed first a film about the Tasmanian devils. The animals are endangered because many of them die due to a infectious face tumour. I could even pet a devil, it has a fine fur. The Tasmanian Devils seemed to be very relaxed and the keeper could go to them. Then it started to rain slightly. It got stronger and I decided to go back to the accommodation. As I arrived it was coming down in buckets.