Following on from the last post, we continued our East Coast birthday adventure further North just past Bicheno. Douglas Apsley National Park is home to a very popular watering hole a mere 5 minute walk from the car park. It’s certainly very nice (provided there aren’t a bunch of bogans playing loud music and smoking) but far greater riches await those willing to go that bit further.
If you have 3-4 hours spare and don’t mind a spot of hiking, then you can walk around to the Apsley River gorge and then follow it back to the aforementioned waterhole. Regular readers of this blog will know that since coming to Tasmania, I’ve been on quite a few walks of varying length, difficulty and terrain. This walk has easily slipped itself into my top 3 so far.
After about an hour of fairly easy hiking through the bush and up and over the ridgeline to the top of the gorge, you arrive back down at the Apsley River. Feel free to go right at this point but you’ll be walking for a while and going nowhere 🙂 Take a left and you’ll be on the right track. What follows is some of the funnest walking you can do in Tasmania. Endless rock pools and massive boulders are the name of the game and ever so often, you’ll come across some of the most pristine pools imaginable.
We could have easily spent all day in one particular pool, it was crystal clear and not horrendously cold. It was a super warm day so the cool water was really quite pleasant. One image I took of this location proved pretty popular online and received a boat load of comments, which nice as it was, also made me think of the impact of such a location becoming really popular. If you are planning on going to Douglas Apsley, please please PLEASE treat it with the utmost of respect. Don’t leave any rubbish behind, tread carefully on the marked path only and just be respectful of this special place. Thank you in advance 🙂
Czeching Out Tasmania 