Waterfall Valley Hut to Lake Windemere

With the leaky thermarests, you might expect that it was a restless night. Exhaustion, however, is a wonderful sleeping pill. Nathan and I woke at about 8:00 (after most other tent hikers had breakfast and packed their tents and came by the hut to wash up their dirty dishes). Having realized that we were carrying much heavier food than everyone else, we decided to eat the heaviest breakfast we could....pancakes.

Our cookstove is a whispalite...which has a great reputation for being reliable, light, and boils water very quickly. Our stove also has a reputation for releasing the occasional fireball when you light it. I had wanted to buy another stove, but Nathan promised he would do all the cooking so I wouldn't burn my eyebrows off. Clever boy that he is, he had deduced that if he does all the cooking, I would have to do all the washing up. Let's just say, when you are trying to scrub off maple syrup without soap you realize just how smart your husband is.

As we packed up, hikers stopped by to chat. Their opening comment to Nathan was always, "have you seen your neck? It's really sunburnt." Yesterday had been a beautiful sunny day, about 85 degrees in Tassie. Not hot at all by WA standards. But, because of the heat in WA, we don't usually spend 10 hours in the sun. Both of us had sunburned necks, ears, temples, and perhaps most awkwardly the backs of our hands. Because Tassie has a reputation for being cold and wet, we had only packed about 2 oz of suncreen (and 10 oz of bugspray) and began rationing it out for our 7 day trip.

We hit the trail by 9:00 am (leisurely start) but weren't worried as today was a scheduled short day. The trail led off through a beautiful valley. As late as we were, we had the valley to ourselves. Looking at the birds and the clouds around the mountains, the sun peeking into deeper parts of the valley, it was like walking through a postcard.
As we hiked out of the valley, we crossed a large plain in full sun. Shade was rare and at every tree we passed a group of hikers stopped to rest for their morning snack. We marched on promising ourselves we would take a rest and reapply sunscreen at Lake Wills.

At the turnoff to the Lake, we dropped our packs. We had been warned about crows, possums, and quolls stealing food from packs at these turn offs. These animals were smart enough to know that food was usually kept accessible to the hikers so they looked for zippers to open in search of food. We covered our packs in our rain gear, then stacked our packs on top of each other to prevent theft.

After walking about 1k on a easy boardwalk, we reached a small beach facing Barn Bluff. We took off our boots (HEAVEN) and Nathan waded into the cold water to cool his feet. Now, you probably know but I have an intense dislike of ticks (some might call it a phobia), but reading our guidebooks had tranferred this phobia to other blood-sucking organisms. Listed under dangers in our guide book, were the following: Exposure, Snake Bites, River Crossings, Gastro, and Leech Bites. I don't want everyone to think I'm a big weenie. I don't like the idea of leeches but felt I could be an adult and calmly remove a leech if need be---- UNTIL I read the following sentence, "If unfortunate to have a leach in a sensitive place, SUCH AS AN EYE, then apply a mild salt solution until the leech releases." I brought an entire salt shaker to surround my sleeping bag in salt as a circle of protection.

I sat on the sand thinking about leeches and my hot feet when a family of 5 arrived at the beach. Scott and Christine and their 3 girls (Mikaela (14), Amy(11), and Sophie (9)). Everyone straight in the water to cool off. That's when I realized I was being a weenie....and I got in. It was bliss. Besides, with all these young girls they had much tenderer meat than me to feed on.

that's me, looking for leeches

When we left the lake, we returned to the turnoff to pick up our packs. A few people hadn't taken precautions, their bags had been burgled. Ravens had tried to make off with fresh apples. (For those of you non-hikers, fresh fruit is a LUXURY--very heavy. So to lose a lb of apples that you had carried over cradle mountain is a tragedy).

Barn Bluff on the left and Cradle Mountain on the right. We've come a long way baby!

The hike took us between several highland lakes, before we finally wound our way down to Lake Windemere, a large lake about 300 m from our campsite. We paused there for a late lunch before hiking up to the campsite to set up our tent. By the time we arrived, we couldn't find a tent platform to ourselves. We ended up sharing with a father and son, Michael and Chris.

At this point, we have another realization about why our packs are so heavy compared to everyone else. Nathan and I carry a 3-person tent. It has enough space for us to store our packs inside the tent without having to sleep on our side all night. Everyone else at the campsite has a 2 person tent and stores their packs in the hut (to prevent animal break-ins). Our tent weighs 4kg, our neighbor's tent was just under 2kg. We didn't even fit on the tent platform!

After setting up, we wandered back down to the Lake for a swim. The water was cold, but eventually Nathan tiptoed his way in. While we were swimming, we met another couple from WA, Sharon and Dean, that had made a goal to swim EVERY DAY on the trail.

Nathan thinks the water is too cold! What sort of Alaskan did I marry?

You may not realize how important this is. Most people (except Nathan and I) only bring 2 sets of clothes for the hike: A set of clothes you hike in, and a set of clothes that you change into at camp. With as physically demanding as some of the hiking is, you can imagine what the hiking clothes smell like even after 2 days. That's why swimming daily is a good goal. Nathan and I had one extra set of clothes that means we could wash one pair and wear a dry pair the next day.
There is a problem with this. It means you have to put a wet pair of clothes in your pack while you hike, which can be just as gross and if you think about it: WET CLOTHES ARE HEAVY. Next time, I think I'd rather stink.

Refreshed after our swim and dinner, we decide to sneak down to the Lake to see if we can achieve one of our goals for the trip, seeing a platypus in the wild. All is still in the deepening dusk, until a wombat snuffles its way across the path into some deeper scrub brush near the water. Eventually, we give up waiting and return to our tent. Tomorrow is the longest day of hiking and rumours have circulated it will reach 90 degrees. We promise ourselves an early start--7:00 AM.