Adventure and creativity - my goals for 2019. So, I decided to start the year with a little adventure. Well, to be honest I started 2019 at home watching the Sydney fireworks in my pjs. But, the next day I headed off in Sally for a mini solo adventure. Here we are settling in for the first of 2 nights of free camping at Ben Lomond National Park.
The campsite was full. I was lucky to get the last parking spot. But it was quiet once the small crying child was asleep and the out of tune singing from up the hill stopped, mercifully before sunset. A wallaby came quietly to share my dinner time. Just after 8am the next morning I had breakfasted, packed my lunch and driven up the road a few kms to Carr Villa, a scout hut and car park where more people were camped. I was ready to climb Tasmania's second highest mountain. The sun was already hot.
There is something mystical about being up above the clouds.
The locals kept a wary eye on me.
This is what I came to see - scoporia in flower.
Scoporia richea is endemic to Tasmania, only grows up high in the mountains, has sharp pointy leaves, grows 40-100cm high, flowers are a range of reddish, yellow and orange, and sometimes white and pink.
The plateau looked like an artist had come along and dabbed orange, yellow, russet, orchre, burnt sienna paint on a background of grey and green. Autumnal colours for summer.
There were other flowers too. Mountain rocket.
Orites revolta
Some sort of yellow daisy
Sundew, a small insectivorous plant growing amongst pineapple grass.
Cushion plants which look like soft mossy cushions but are quite hard to touch
Morning tea. What a view.
Eyebright, I think. At first they were in occasional clumps. A little higher they were sprinkled across large areas of short grass, an alpine flower meadow.
A meadow of mountain rocket.
More scoporia, lots more scoporia.
What the heck are these regular sized dimples in the tarns? Looking closely, I could see they were made by tadpoles, nosing around in the soft sludgey silt on the bottom.
A disused alpine club chalet from the mid 20th century.
And then I was at the top. Legges Tor is the highest point on Ben Lomond. For a few minutes I was the second highest person in Tasmania at 1572 metres. That is assuming there was also someone standing on top of Mt Ossa at the same time, which I figured was quite likely given the amazing weather and that this is the time of year that the Overland Track is often fully booked out. I have been here before, but that day was in June, snow was beginning to fall and there was no view at all.
Shame about the ugly ski buildings and infrastructure dotted about the place, albeit only in one small part of the plateau.
There was more brilliant scoporia behind the ski village.
I was hot. There are no trees. The only shade I could find was on the veranda of the only pub/cafe which was closed, but I took my boots and sweaty socks off and made myself at home. The village was eerily deserted, devoid of people although there were three cars in the carpark. Some wallabies were hopping around. One stopped to stare at me through the railings. Two magnificent wedgetailed eagles soared above me. One human appeared, a tourist from NSW, who had driven up Jacobs Ladder. She was suitably impressed by the beauty of the landscape.
After my lunch I had to decide which route to take back down to my car. I wandered around the scoporia fields for a bit.
The scoporia lit up the plateau into the distance.
It was hard to see the flittering birds I could hear twittering. This is an Australasian or Richard's Pipit.
Then I walked down the road. The only road up to the plateau and ski village. Jacob's Ladder has six hairpin bends, all named - Gateway, Watchtower, Waterfall, Hanging, Black and Strickland. I waited at these corners for a few cars to pass me on the narrow gravel road.
More flowers on the roadside.
And dramatic views of forested valleys and towering dolerite cliffs.
Look carefully and you can just see a red car on the lower section of the road and a white campervan near the top. I had flagged the van down as they had left the back door open when they drove off after taking photos from the bottom of the ladder. There were three very excited young women in the front seat, clearly enjoying their adventure too.
I walked 7km down the road admiring the views, appreciating the patchy thin shade of the gum trees back to where Sally was waiting at Carr Villa. Three cars slowed to offer me a lift and the park rangers pulled up to check I was ok and tell me that tomorrow was a total fire ban day.
Back at the camp I found a site with dappled shade. I tried to sit outside but the mossies wanted an early dinner so I retreated inside. There was a nice breeze and I needed it to cool the van so I pegged up my mossie net across the back door. It worked very well. I could get used to this lifestyle - reading, walking, writing, drawing, exploring, wandering...
These last photos are obviously not at Ben Lomond but I have to share. The next day I drove to St Helens on the east coast to visit a friend. We spent the afternoon in front of her air conditioner as the temperature was 35.5, and it seems that Sally's air con and fan have stopped working. The next day we went for a stroll along the breakwater at the entrance to the bay and watched a large seal chasing fish back and forth beside us.
A great start to the year. Feeling blessed.
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