Cradle Mountain

Submitted by geoff on Sun, 13/02/2011 - 05:54
in
Image: Simon Lieschke

On Day 1 we will pass by Cradle Mountain and if the weather and time permits we will attempt to climb it. See the Wikipedia article below for more information.

Cradle Mountain is a mountain in the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park, Tasmania, Australia. Rising to 1,545 metres above sea level it is one of the principal tourist sites in Tasmania, owing to its natural beauty. The mountain is composed of dolerite columns, similar to many of the other mountains in the area.

Access

The area around the mountain has a large number of day walks, as well as being one terminus of the Overland Track. The mountain is frequently climbed by tourists, virtually year round. It is a strenuous (recommended allotted time: 6.5 hours) return hike from the Dove Lake car park. The climb up the rocky part of the mountain involves scrambling over large boulders for several hundred metres. The entire climb is exposed to any bad weather that may arrive quickly and at any time. From the summit, (where there was a trig point tower) there are spectacular 360° views, encompassing Dove Lake, Barn Bluff and Mount Ossa.

Features

Cradle Mountain seen from the south, from neighbouring mountain Barn Bluff
The mountain rises above the glacially formed Dove Lake (934m), Lake Wilks, and Crater Lake.
The mountain has four named summits. In order of height they are Cradle Mountain (1,545 m (5,069 ft)), Smithies Peak (1,545 m (5,069 ft)), Weindorfers Tower (1,459 metres (4,787 ft)) and Little Horn (1,355 m (4,446 ft))
The mountain itself is named after its resemblance to a gold mining cradle.

Flora

The area is covered in a wide variety of alpine and sub-alpine vegetation, most notably including the colourful deciduous Nothofagus gunnii (Deciduous Beech), itself an anomaly given that most Australian native flora is evergreen, and the Gymnoschoenus sphaerocephalus (Button Grass) which dominates the alpine wet sedgelands. Some plants that grow on the mountain include the mountain buzzy, the heart berry, the alpine strawberry, the waratah, the King Billy pine and the pencil pine.