Tasmania is the large island off the south of mainland Australia, it is an incredibly diverse place when it comes to geography with tall mountains that can get snow at any time of year, through to amazing beaches and wild stretches of coast. Much of the island is largely untouched as over half of it is protected national parks.
In early 2014 I was commissioned by Lonely Planet and Flight Centre (a travel agent) to travel to Tasmania in Australia for a joint project between them and Tourism Tasmania. Up until that point I had seen most of mainland Australia, but hadn't ever been to Tasmania.
That trip created an addiction... I've lost count at how many trips to Tasmania I have done since, both my wife and I love it so much that we're planning to spend some serious time there at some point, maybe even move there for a period of time. I've been to Tasmania in every season now and by far my favourite time of year is mid-autumn through to the end of winter, this is their wettest time of year and it frequently snows in the mountains. All the extra rain and snow flows on down to the many, many waterfalls that Tasmania has.
Every single trip I've done to Tasmania I've taken time to spend a few days at the iconic Cradle Mountain. Cradle Mountain is a very mountainous area with some great lakes to photograph as well. It snows there quite a bit every year, I've managed to time my visits with the snow a few times.
On my last trip to Tasmania I managed to time it right as several massive blizzards hit the area, I was the last vehicle in to Cradle Mountain before they closed the roads completely. I'd never experienced so much snow! With the roads closed I decided to hike to Dove Lake from the hotels, it is about 18kms return... I spent the day exploring and taking photos and had the whole area to myself, was pretty amazed to have the entire place to myself as usually it is fairly busy with tourists.
The wildlife in the region is pretty incredible and fairly easily approached for photos. I have a personal aversion to animals in captivity under most circumstances, so I don't visit most zoos unless they have a stellar reputation in the work they are doing, all my photos of animals are in the wild unless otherwise stated. I make one exception in Tasmania.
Every trip I go to a rehabilitation program for Tasmanian Devils. These amazing creatures have been struck down with weird facial tumours in most of their wild populations, so scientists and conservationists have collected healthy populations and are breeding them in sanctuaries with the aim of re-releasing them into the wild. Devils at Cradle is the one at Cradle Mountain, there are programs like it in several other places across Tasmania.
I absolutely love the Tasmanian Devils, they have some attitude and sound like they could kill you but it is one of the few species in Australia that would not harm you at all.
I know this post is a little dis-jointed, just wanted to show off some of my favourite part of Australia at my favourite time of year though. Here are some more photos:
Hope you've enjoyed the photos, there will be a few more posts just about Tasmania in the coming weeks.
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