I'm just back from a lovely week in Tasmania. We flew into Launceston and after a quick look around (Cataract Gorge is nice, but the rest of the city seemed pretty sleepy) we headed across to Cradle Mountain.
I got up early for a run around Dove Lake before breakfast. It was like running in winter! It was cold and wet and I was glad that I had taken my gloves to keep my fingers warm. The path round the lake is pretty well made, but it's still a challenging run with all of the undulations.
We returned after breakfast, not to climb to the top of Cradle Mountain, but to do the High level circuit of Dove Lake. The map I purchased in the information centre described it as a 'moderate-difficult' walk. With a healthy dose of arrogance I wasn't expecting it to be much of a challenge!
It turned out to be a lot more technical than I expected with steep descents and some quite challenging pathways. A couple of hours in it became clear that we weren't going to get round the whole circuit in the day so ended up take a short cut marked 'rough and steep' to get us back to base before nightfall. I'm not going to admit how far we walked during the day. However, when I measured the walk when we got home it was truly unimpressive considering we were trekking for seven and a half hours!!
Overall it was a lovely day. The not-so-high mountains and glacially formed landscape reminded me a lot of Lake District in the UK.
Before we set off the following morning for the next leg of our trip I ran part of the Cradle Mountain boardwalk that goes from the entrance of the National Park towards Dove Lake. It was another stunningly scenic run with low mist hanging in the valley and no other sole stupid enough to be out at 6:30!
You can see my photos from Launceston and Cradle Mountain here.
That is so cool, I'd love to visit Tasmania!
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