{"id":7888,"date":"2016-07-09T23:50:09","date_gmt":"2016-07-09T13:50:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/?p=7888"},"modified":"2016-07-09T23:50:09","modified_gmt":"2016-07-09T13:50:09","slug":"tasmania-2014-part-3-hobart-to-queenstown-to-cradle-mountain-and-liffey-falls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/?p=7888","title":{"rendered":"Tasmania 2014 part #3 \u2013 Hobart to Queenstown to Cradle Mountain and Liffey Falls"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Well thanks to the truncated activities on this stretch of the trip due to the weather, so is this blog entry!<\/p>\n

The conditions varied between \u201cMelbourne\u201d and \u201cperfect storm\u201d as we made our way north so we pulled the pin on planned stops like Lake Dobson <\/em>and Nelson Falls<\/em> and continued directly to Queenstown where it started to let up around the scenic Lake Burbury<\/strong>. A little further along there\u2019s an old copper mine on the outskirts of Queenstown, take the goat trail to the top where you\u2019ll find a outset viewing platform to really take in the views and test your vertigo.<\/p>\n

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Coming down the mountain, just before the town there are a couple lookout points for photo ops with views of the road snaking around the mountains.<\/p>\n

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The next day we awoke to\u2026 oh look\u2026 more rain! The drive to Cradle mountain was slow and tedious, made worse with the traffic thickening and the very narrow parts of the road closer to the national park. You know you\u2019re running out of room when you need to fold in your side mirrors so they don\u2019t clip a guide post or on coming cars! Thankfully the rental car survived unscathed even though we were ready to ghostie it off the mountain by then.<\/p>\n

Travel tip:
\nLittle towns like Rosebery are peppered through out the mountain ranges and are good places to stop for a bite to eat and for some supplies for the day ahead.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Travel tip:
\nIf you didn\u2019t buy a parks pass for all the parks or are only visiting Cradle, you will need to stop at the visitor\u2019s center to purchase a ticket. The lines can be quite long if there is a tour group, so factor this into your itinerary.<\/em><\/p>\n

Pulling into the Cradle mountain car park we could see how grand the place\u2026 could be, alas the drizzle was becoming steady rain again and it was pretty much a white out. After having lunch in the car and watching many people walk half way down to the boat house and turn around for an hour, the rain radar showed no sign of letting up so we reluctantly moved on to our next stop, Deloraine<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

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Travel tip:
\nWhen they say the weather can turn quickly (and severely) they mean it, so come prepared. A small folding umbrella or emergency poncho is probably not going to cut it in anything more than the most mildest of conditions, but its probably better than nothing! A hardshell jacket, rain paints (or at least gaiters) and waterproof boots are a good start. Wearing your fave pair of J\u2019s is not advisable even in the dry, yep there were several people at the visitor center wearing these and other basketball shoes that you wouldn\u2019t even play basketball in let alone try to tackle wet trails with!<\/em><\/p>\n

One small plus to the never ending rain, many of the small creeks had come alive with flowing streams which I\u2019m sure was also a nice welcome to some of the bushfire strickened areas we drove through.<\/p>\n

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Travel tip:
\nLooking for some good valued eats while staying in Deloraine? Check out Sullivan’s on the river. Classic “fish n chip” shop style snack bar on one side and dine in restaurant on the other. After eyeballing the heaped “I made this myself” homestyle pizzas it was an easy and filling choice \ud83d\ude00<\/em><\/p>\n

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The next morning we woke up thinking, you know what we haven\u2019t had in a while? RAIN! And lots of it! Yep mother nature was still playing that ol’ broken record so it was another slow and tedious drive to Liffey falls<\/strong>. The unsealed parts of the road, replaced by flowing streams did little for the nerves nor the confidence we had in the rental car, which had gone from white to completely brown.<\/p>\n

The plus to all the rain did mean the falls were flowing nicely and fellow sightseers were few and far between which made it was easy to get some photos without having to fight the crowds.<\/p>\n

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After all the fast forwarding of planned stops we ended up a little time spare before heading to Launceston for our flight home so we made a quick detour to the Melita Honey farm<\/a> in Chudleigh<\/strong>, only the little store was open but it was nonetheless packed. They of course have plenty of honey and honey based food and body\/health products \u2026and ice cream \ud83d\ude09 There were also plenty honey and bee related souvenirs and trinkets along with a small display and information on bees and the harvesting of honey.<\/p>\n

Travel tip: the farm is not really near anything else, not even toilets, but continue down the road for a minute or two for a rest stop if the rain and cold has gotten the better of your bladder.<\/em><\/p>\n

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The final coup de gras and bit of salt in the wound was a nice sunset as we were leaving, gotta love a place with a sense of humor even if we were the butt of the joke. Hehe butt. Ok, so there was alot of whinging about the weather but not enough to deter us from a return trip, hopefully in the not too distant future.<\/p>\n

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Tasmania 2014 part #1 \u2013 Arrival, Eaglehawk Neck<\/a>
\nTasmania 2014 part #2 \u2013 Port Arthur and Salamanca markets<\/a>
\nTasmania 2014 part #3 \u2013 Hobart to Queenstown to Cradle Mountain and Liffey Falls<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well thanks to the truncated activities on this stretch of the trip due to the weather, so is this blog entry! The conditions varied between \u201cMelbourne\u201d and \u201cperfect storm\u201d as we made our way north so we pulled the pin on planned stops like Lake Dobson and Nelson Falls and continued directly to Queenstown where […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2348,388],"tags":[2736,2735,2737,2738,2734,2714],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7888"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7888"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7888\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7957,"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7888\/revisions\/7957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soulbridgemedia.com\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}