Eaglehawk Neck and more

Eaglehawk Neck is not a place that thrills me, in that it has no high mountains and no lush rainforest, but I do like beaches and cliffs, so, as my camera club had a weekend there last weekend, I decided to join in.


Sunset Tessellated Pavement

It would be fun to see the Tessellated Pavement under different lighting conditions, and spend some time at the beach. I have always found the paths to be too tame and manicured for my particular tastes, but the tourists like them, and they need some spots, so this one does the trick.

Aurora, Tessellated Pavement

As it turned out, I hardly saw my club members at all, but I made some lovely friends instead, and they gave the trip a pleasant flavour. In particular, I had fun with Daniel and Sarah from Sydney while we waited in the cold for the moon to set so it would be dark enough for aurora spotting. I had delicious coffee on the hill with them next morning, but had to do the 1 a.m. shift alone, as nobody else seemed to want to get out of bed at that hour. I received a small aurora as a reward.

Happy dog

Tessa, my dog, mostly lived in the car, as my accommodation was a “pets not allowed” place, but Tessie is fine with that, as she knows I keep popping in to visit her, and that she gets several runs and walks each day. She feels secure in the car, and does not suffer from the normal separation anxiety that has been her lot since Bruce’s death. We both adored the Neck beach, where dogs are allowed to romp and play. She dashed in and out of the surf with joy. It’s so great to find a beach that lets dogs have some fun.

Happy dog

On the day I left, I popped into the Springs on kunanyi, and made friends with Sharon; we had fun walking trails together and talking heaps.
The next few days were spent admiring the wonderful Gussy and Abby, and watching gymnastics, waterpolo, chess club and the regional Primary School Athletics Championships –  photographing Abby’s gym and Gussy’s Aths races.
Shown here are some highlights from the trip..

Start of the bell lap, 800ms

Shower Falls, Camp Falls 2018 TAS Peninsula Apr

Shower Falls and Camp Falls, TAS Peninsula, Apr 2018


My family had hired a shack at Eaglehawk Neck on the Tas Peninsula for Easter, so I decided to use my close proximity to the Shower and Camp Falls to do a quick bag. I set my alarm for 6 a.m. to catch sunrise on my way (plenty of time, as sunrise was not until 7.17, so I thought), and fell happily asleep. Trouble was, my relatives had mislead me and I hadn’t double-checked. I awoke to a sky already pink (it was supposed to be black at that hour): daylight savings had begun in the morning, and not in the evening as they maintained. Of course, it is my fault too for not doing my own investigation on when the clocks changed. Meanwhile, I had all but missed dawn. Pity, as it was a nice one.


As you can see, I did at least catch the tail end of it, but had to use the huge railings as a tripod, as I didn’t have time to set up. The railings make my life rather tricky, actually, as they are so tall that when my camera is resting on them, I can’t see through the eyepiece: it’s too high. My camera doesn’t fit in the narrow strips between rails that they allow. In order to get a good photo, I need to actually climb over the railings, which I didn’t have time for on this morning. (I did the next day). They say they are interested in safety. It would actually be a lot safer if their railings were not so high so that those who want to see don’t have to climb to be able to do so. Don’t scoff you men until you’ve tried feeling what it’s like to be forced to look at nature from behind wretched bars.


Anyway, dawn duly photographed, I set off to find my waterfalls. I really hated the highway I now had to walk on in order to reach Waterfall Bay. It was wide, smooth, glary, manicured, totally unnatural and utterly boring. My feet dragged with the monotony of the smoothed-out, unchallenging surface. I felt like Shakespeare’s reluctant schoolboy drudging his way to the day’s orchestrated boredom. Twenty minutes later, I was at Waterfall Bay carpark. Oh joy and bliss. Here they haven’t “improved” on nature, and I was allowed to walk on an appealing narrow, unpredictable dirt path. No doubt they have plans to ruin it at some future date, and call that ruination “improvement”. On this little path, you could actually get to the edge and peep over if you wanted to. You got to think about where you placed your feet instead of going into robot mode, a brain-dead automaton. This section, alas, only lasted fifteen minutes, but it was a relief after the wide cousin that preceded it.


Shower Falls
“Camp Creek”, as I have dubbed it (nameless on my map), was running, so I knew I would get something at the falls. As there was a nice little track leading to the lower Shower Falls, I took it first and photographed them before heading upstream to Camp Falls, which were just a tiny bit lower than the track.


Shower Falls
I definitely preferred Shower Falls. The way back was just a reversal of the way out, except that it was, for me, full of guilt, as I had taken longer than anticipated, and I knew the children would be eager for Easter Eggs. I was holding things up.


Camp Falls