Getting In Touch With The Wildlife
Sun Herald
Sunday December 18, 1988
IT IS rare to find a place where it is possible to watch nocturnal animals in the wild without much patience and discomfort.
Yet at Cradle Mountain Lodge, an 80-minute drive south of Devonport, Tasmania, the wait for darkness has been transformed into a pleasure.
Warm, friendly surroundings, superb food and, for children, the opportunity for an early supper followed by a torchlit wombat hunt, all contribute to the unique ambience.
Adults can have a hearty five-course meal, memorable as much for the freshness of local ingredients as for the quality of cooking, washed down with local or mainland wine. By the time cheese and coffee have been consumed, the animals begin to come to you.
Enticed by food provided by the kitchen staff, wallabies are lured to a floodlit area. They are followed by huge possums, perhaps with a baby atop, who skirt the veranda (where you can watch) with the agility of an acrobat and showing little shyness.
Later, a strange cry from the surrounding tussocks of grass temporarily sends possums scampering skywards while wallabies also disappear into the dark.
It is then that spotted Tasmanian cats and the fearsome-looking devils slink from the gloom and come within feet of the lodge.
The apparent remoteness of the lodge on the boundary of the Cradle Mountain-St Clair National Park - which was inscribed on the World Heritage List of UNESCO in 1982 - provides many advantages.
Reliance on local products from what has long been a major vegetable-raising region ensures that superb meals are varied and always freshly prepared. Local trout, grilled to perfection, have a flavour that would have been lost had they been landed any earlier.
The range of accommodation and services runs from cabins with log fires and twin-share jacuzzis that overlook a mountain torrent, to economy price and simple bunk-style accommodation where most people prefer to self-cater, using excellent facilities installed by the Tasmanian Government but managed by Cradle Mountain Lodge.
Among a noteworthy catalogue of memories, the list of daily activities is most vivid. None, incidentally, seems to incur any extra charge to visitors, whether they are staying in de luxe or economy class accommodation.
The choices change each day.
You may get into condition by taking a leisurely stroll through the"Enchanted Forest", with a guide whose sympathetic knowledge of the unique environment is matched only by his encyclopedic knowledge of the habits and habitats of the local flora and fauna. This also enables you to smell the scent of local myrtle and see 1,000-year-old king william pines.
In contrast, you may prefer to try a really hard hike over hill and dale to the top of Cradle Mountain and back - a seven-hour trek.
Also, you may receive lessons in the gentle art of fly-fishing for trout in the lodge's own lake, but with barbless hooks so that the fish, if caught, may be freed to fight again.
Or, if more daring, then do try the activity of abseiling, first from a mere 10-metre cliff, and then, when confidence and skill have been gained, from a more challenging outcrop that soars 30 metres above the base.
Such activities stimulate a healthy appetite and it is wise to tuck a good breakfast beneath your belt before emerging into the bracing air.
Lunch, chosen from a blackboard menu, offers a choice of an English pub-style ploughman's plate, or a monster "lodge meat and vegetable pie"; or more delicate, a grilled trout. Each comes with a mini wholemeal loaf that is served hot.
Dinner, at $23 a head, begins with pa~te (smoked fish one night, chicken liver and liqueur another), followed by soup or pasta. The main course may vary from stuffed breast of turkey to roast veal. All vegetables are locally grown and taste as though they were picked the same day. They are simply, yet superbly, presented.
A surprisingly exotic range of desserts follows (for example, apricot strudel with home-made ice cream), then a cheese board with some six local varieties.
There's coffee, of course, and it's up to you whether you pick a local or mainland wine - there's no wine list, just peep into the "cellar" and choose from a surprisingly varied range.
There's fun too.
During the day, a competition on a ropeway (known as a Ropeo) where men, women and children try to negotiate a commando-style course without once placing a toe on terra firma.
In the evening, the air of the bar comes alive with music for dancing. It may range from the country tunes of a local bush band (complete with lagerphone and bush bass) to more modern pieces from an electronic device.
One of the joys of Cradle Mountain Lodge is that it's entirely up to visitors whether they indulge in the meals prepared there, or make their own.
Either way, you are welcome to use whatever activities and other entertainment are provided.
The area can be a magnet for the energetic, for those that wish to photograph its sights, while also being a lure to people wishing to immerse themselves in the unique wilderness environment.
Given such a multitude of options, this oasis on the edge of the wilderness is also becoming well known as a conference locale.
For where else, after a hard day's discussion, can you find so many diverse and different ways to unwind?
TRAVELLERS' CHECKLIST
GETTING THERE: Fly by East-West Airlines or Ansett to Devonport then hire a car (20 per cent discount from Budget for anyone who flies with East-West) to take you the 100km south. Or take your own car by Abel Tasman roll-on roll-off car ferry from Melbourne to Devonport.
ACCOMMODATION: Cabins $69 twin or single, Lodge $55 double, $43 single, bunkhouse accommodation about $10 a head.
TO FIND OUT MORE: Contact P & O Resorts, 482 Kingsford Smith Drive, Brisbane, Queensland, 4007; phone (07) 2688224 or Cradle Mountain Lodge, PO Box 153 Sheffield, Tasmania, 7306; phone (004) 921303.
© 1988 Sun Herald
