Kanunnah Bridge over the Arthur River, taking its name from the palawa name for ‘Tasmanian Tiger.’

Upstream from the bridge

Downstream

The forested section of the Tarkine Forest Drive

View from Sumac Lookout over the Tarkine rainforest

Julius River Forest Reserve has cool temperate rainforest.

Tasmanian laurel (Anopterus glandulosus) growing in the stream bed.

Filmy fern (Hymenophyllaceae)

A flooded limestone sinkhole

Kookaburra at the sinkhole

Milkshakes Hills Forest Reserve – this is a track for logging trucks. Inthe Tarkine, blockades and protests by environmental groups have targeted logging there since early 2020.  A permanent logging zone covers 30,000 hectares of the Tarkine (takanya). In 2014, the Tasmanian government introduced legislation weakening the status of regional reserves and conservation areas, allowing them to be logged, including reserves protected since 1980.

A Tarkine wildflower

There were many trees partially covering the road – some appeared to have been there for some time.

We cross the Arthur River again at Tayatea

After a long and winding road, we re-enter farmland and meet these guys in magic light.

The road loops to re-enter the forest at Trowutta Arch Rainforest Walk.

Green grows on green here.

Approaching the arch in a Dicksonia tree fern forest.

Trowutta Arch in a jagged wall of limestone.

Beech forest

Nothofagus leaves are coppery when new.

Pea flower and Pimelea linifolia (below) as the road leaves the rainforest.

And in Miss Cowgeniality (Junior section) 2024, the winner is Number 2454. And Number 2454, what do you wish for? “World peace.”

Tasmanian waratahs growing at a farm property on the way back to Smithton.

After dinner at the Bridge Hotel in Smithton (they kindly took our order – the last of the night at 7:45pm), we returned to Stanley to see the penguins at Godfreys Beach or so we thought. We saw 13 penguins, 7 were walking on roads and footpaths in the town area including the main street and another 6 under the red lights of the purpose-built viewing platform.

Little penguin in the town area. At 40-45cm tall and weighing 1kg, the Little Penguin is the smallest penguin in the world. They have a distinctive slaty blue plumage.

Racing across the bitumen road in town ….

…and below at the viewing platform.

When I become a lawyer, I want to defend a penguin….just so I can say, “Your honour!! My client clearly isn’t a flight risk.”

That’s not a penguin!

Another penguin in town on the way back to our Stanley accommodation.