April 18 Drive to Corinna (Day 204)
This morning we took a walk around town in a cool breeze under cloudy skies. We were glad we had ‘cracked the nut’ yesterday, it was a much nicer, sunny day! On the other side of town we walked out onto the Penguin viewing platform at the edge of Godfrey’s Beach and read the information about the cute little blue penguins that nest here. They are the same species that nest on the shores of New Zealand as well. Last night as we walked back to the camper along the rocky shore after our restaurant dinner we saw about 8 of the little penguins among the rocks or in the grass nearby, preening their feathers and getting ready for a nice snooze in their burrows among the rocks.
None of our nighttime pictures came out very good, so this is a good substitute! These penguins are the smallest penguin species and so darned cute!
After our walk, that ended with rain beginning to fall, we packed up the camper and headed out for the little town of Corinna in the “wild west” of Tasmania. We decided not to take the ‘dry weather only’ gravel road since it was raining, but opted for the ‘sealed’ roads winding through farmland to the tiny iron-ore mining village of Savage River. The road then became gravel for the last 20km, with a white, slick looking well-packed surface twisting and turning over high tussock grass plateaus then descending into dark, thick rainforest!
We finally arrived at Corinna, a tiny outpost that if not for the Eco-Village ‘resort’ would be a ghost town! Corinna was founded during a late 1800’s gold rush in the area and boasted 2500 residents in it’s heyday in the 1890’s. The resort makes use of the old hotel and several miner’s cabins as restaurant and lodgings, along with a basic campground with raised platforms for tents to try and stay dry above the wet rainforest floor.
A couple of motorcycles parked in front of The Tarkine Hotel Eco-Village stirred memories of our motorcycle riding days!
We had booked a night at the campground and set up, then headed to the Ahrberg Bar for happy hour, where the woodstove was warming up the place!