Whip Snake
The Mountain viewed from Cradle Valley
Hello readers,
Greetings from Cradle Mountain one of the nicest places we have visited.
We were a little bit late to bed last night and subsequently a bit tardy this morning. The weather was cloudy to start with but soon broke up to a mostly sunny warm day prompting me to set up the solar panel as we are in an unpowered site.
After showers and breakfast we hopped into Julies van and drove into the park to the Ronny Creek car park. We took the Cradle Valley trail back towards the Ranger Station. The trail uses a boardwalk, the underneath of which carries electricity and sewerage in the appropriate conduits to and from Dove Lake.
At the start of the walk I spotted a small "whip" snake. This is classified as only slightly venomous in the bee sting type category, which prompted Susan to crouch over it and shoot pictures and video. The walk seemed quite easy however did involve some fairly good gradients. We enjoyed the various vistas of Cradle Mountain as we travelled away from it. I spent much of the time furiously flicking through "Significant Flora of Cradle Mountain" trying to identify various trees and shrubs. This can be quite hazardous when a step is inserted in the path and your head is in the book! Our intention was to walk to the interpretive centre and return. However time was against us, well against Julie who had to return to Nubeena so we caught the shuttle bus out of the park and back in again.
Returning to the visitor centre we had a light lunch before saying our goodbyes to Julie. We returned to the camp site. My right ankle had stiffened up while sitting an after effect of stepping in a bog hole yesterday when I ventured off the board walk to get a wombat close up.
Susan decided to stroll down the road to Cradle Mountain Chalet to check out the day spa and various treatments and spent time browsing their gift shop and sitting the atrium dozing(nanna naps). After downloading my GPS data from various walks and editing it I walked down to the gift shop at the visitor centre for a quick browse before it closed at 5.
It was then on to trying to repair the temperature probe for the fridge monitor. After much ado with testing for broken cables it appeared the sensor encapsulated in a plastic housing with silastic was the problem. I dug it out and after more fiddling it started working so I decided to encapsulate it for eternity in araldite!
We had sausages and veg for tea cooked on our stove. While I was sitting at the table pre dinner I noticed what I though was a lizard tail about to disappear from my trouser leg under my shirt. Of course it was a nice fat leech looking for tea. It was duly dispatched into the bushes and I contemplated the fact that I had randomly decided to wear long trousers for the last two days instead of my usual shorts. Probably saved me from being an unwitting blood donor.
After dinner we adjourned to the camp kitchen which has power outlets to perform some computing tasks. The points are limited so this is being typed outside on a table next to a bbq powerpoint. it is not overly cold and apart from the usual marauding possums is quite pleasant. Another great day at Cradle Mountain! We have booked in for at least 2 more nights.
Cheers Simon
No comments:
Post a Comment