The Northwest Corner

After completing a full itinerary at Strahan, in beautiful weather, it rained on the last night. The next morning the rain eased so that we could pack up and travel the short distance to Zeehan where we made camp. That afternoon we drove out to Trial Harbour, as a fellow traveller told us it was worth a look. Trial Harbour was the first anchorage on the west coast until Strahan Harbour was established. After a walk on the beach, in gale force winds and stinging sand we visited "The History Room" at a private home. We got talking to the lady of the house and bought some vegies from her garden. There is no power to this community so every house has solar power, wind power or both. The wind power seemed to be totally effective on the day we visited. We had planned to drop into the Pioneer Museum and Gaiety Theatre at Zeehan before we left town but the day was raining and miserable so we motored on. As we travelled further north it rained even harder. We had planned to stop over at Waratah and use this as a base to travel to Cradle Mountain. Due to the low cloud and rain we continued on to the north coast and camped at Crayfish Creek CP. This park is nothing special but it is protected from the wind and it is central to the north west area. Over our three day stay in Crayfish Creek we ventured to Stanley and Arthur River. Arthur River is self titled "The End of the World". Well maybe it's not but you can see it from there.

Overlooking part of the Trial Harbour community with the strong easterly blowing spray off the breakers.

There was some big surf coming onto the west coast.

The garden at the back of the house with "The History Room". The outlook takes in the very small Trial Harbour.

At the north end of town is a camping area, complete with leeches I might add, I had one attached to my leg. Some industrious persons built a rock wall at the base of this small waterfall and created a swimming/spa pool on the beach.

Looking southwards from the camp ground back over Trial Harbour towards the community.

There's not much at Zeehan! This is one end of the Main Street. The restored Gaiety Theatre is on the left. I would have taken a photo of the facade except that the local real estate agent had his blue ute parked in front of it.

This is the other end of the Main Street.

There is a good park with excellent facilities for travellers.

On the approach to Stanley along the coast one is confronted with this majestic sight.

Strahan Harbour full of 'crayboats'.

We haven't reached the top of the 'Nut' yet and already the views are stunning. This is looking west.

We are under the chair lift and looking east over the major part of town. Still not a the top, we had to take several rest stops.

Just to prove that we made it to the top. This is what it looks like. Of course we could have taken the wimps passage up on the chairlift.

Two intrepid travellers on the extreme west coast of Tasmania. Tasmanians call it "The End of the World"

There is a huge amount of drift wood washed up on the beaches here. The outflow of the Arthur River is in the background.

Much of the drift wood is whole trees. The only footprints on this sand other than ours were from wallabies.

The Arthur River flowing, under the single lane bridge, out to sea to the right.

On our way home from Arthur River we drove into Dip Falls. The turn off was only about 8 minutes short of the Crayfish CP. Again this was a fellow traveller recommended attraction. We walked down 165 very large steps to see this view of the bottom section of the falls. The brown 'tannin' stain is clearly evident in the water coming over the falls. Most of the drinking water all over the west coast has this stain in the water, they say that it isn't harmful to humans.

Back up on top again. This is the top section of the falls. You can just make out the beginning of the bottom section of the falls on the extreme left of the photo.