I’ll let the pictures do most of the talking.

It was on to the Spirit of Tasmania to head down south. I was pretty nervous because I really dislike the open ocean (or more acurately, the process of throwing up every time I go into deep ocean). Still, I was assured that I would be fine & I was dosed on sea-sickness medication, so I was primed and ready.

Sydney put on a nice view for me as I headed out past the heads. As it turns out, that was not the biggest surprise! It turned out that I really loved the trip! I ran into a friend on the boat, I ate WAY too much for dinner (Buffet style, but a la carte quality). I must have eaten 300gm of smoked salmon alone!

The arrival at Tassie was a sunny one & spirits were high as I decided to head off to Cradle Mountain.

If I wanted to know why this sweet vehicle had rusted, I didn’t have to ask for long. It started to rain about one minute after this picture.

I did make it to Cradle though. I had a chance to fire off 4 or 5 night shots before clouds rolled in and spoiled that parade too.
When I got there I found out it would cost me $30 to visit the park in the day, not including camping fees. I ended up camping in my car, by a small river outside the national park. It would have gotten down to about freezing point, but I was in a very toasty sleeping bag (thanks Stevie T). I set the alarm for 5am, (easy when you go to bed at 7:30 in the evening) and the next morning saw thicker rain clouds, so I decided to give up on Cradle & see how far down the west coast I could get… But that is another story…
TCG.>.