Cradle Mountain National Park

We only had one full day to explore the park so we made the best of the variable weather. There was lots of low hanging cloud and a some occasional drizzle as we headed out for our day of hiking. The park has limited vehicle access due to the narrow roads but does provide a shuttle service to the various trailheads. This worked out good for us as we were able to do a linear hike to an overlook and end with a circular hike around Dove Lake.

We started at Ronny Creek for the trek to Crater Lake. It started off in a light drizzle on a boardwalk over some wetlands with a very interesting landscape.

We climbed past some waterfalls in a mossy forest.

After about 3 km we were at the shore of Crater Lake.

From here we continued to Wombat Peak for a view of Lake Lilla and Dove Lake with the cloud shrouded mountains in the background.

Descending we had some nice overlooks as the clouds started thinning out with some blue sky starting to arrive.

We arrived at Dove Lake and did the circuit hike around the lake taking in the views of the lake and the mountains. We were pretty well done with hiking for the day after 14km. This was a brief unclouded view of Cradle Mountain.

On the way out of the park, we stopped at the ranger station and saw an echidna foraging next to the walkway.

We took another brief walk to get this photo of the waterfalls at the entrance to the park.

Back in our hotel room (which is on the ground floor), Chris says, hey, look at what is peering in our patio door. There was Wally the Wallaby! About two metres from our door...

He hung out here while we connected with Jenn on FaceTime and the grandkids were able to see him on the Wallycam.