Lake Pedder and The Styx Forest

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A little over two hours northwest of Hobart is a huge hydro-electric generating plant, two large reservoirs and some stunning scenery in the mountains of several ranges in the Southwest National Park.  Along the route, near the town of Maydena is the Styx Forest Reserve, a small area of virgin timber where the tallest hardwood trees on earth grow, among them the current record holder, a giant almost 90 meters tall.  This was a day trip!  We drove north out of Hobart about ten o'clock and were home by seven that night.  It is utterly amazing to have this much beauty so close to us and so accessible.  This forested area is very close to the forests of Mt. Field National Park.               The mountains of the Sentinel range are one of the first things we saw as we approached Lake Pedder.  The broad valleys and rock faces are breathtaking.  Much of the rock in this area is a very white quartzite which we often mistook for snow instead of outcrops.  Lake Pedder is a beautiful, man made lake which overlies the original, natural lake bed which was the largest glacial outwash lake in the world with sandy beaches wide enough for a small landing strip!  The controversy that arose over the flooding of the natural lake helped to create the Australian Green Party.    The Saw Back Range is a long range that runs horizon to horizon across the highway to Lake Pedder and is well named.    The ever changing colors and lighting make it hard to really capture what these mountains look like.  It is a rare day that doesn't have both sunshine and rain, sometimes at the same time! The bridge over the River Styx is a rickety affair that might well usher one into the next world.  We crossed it and found ourselves in a small corner of heaven, though.  This is in the Styx Forest Reserve, a small area of virgin timber set aside by the paper company that owned timber rights.  The lush forest is hard to capture with a camera.  These ferns are probably between six and ten feet in diameter.  Some of them tower over us up to fifteen feet tall.  The Gordon River Gorge is incredibly steep.  It is no wonder they chose this area for the dam.  This is right below the outlet. The Gordon Dam is 140 meters high and holds back the waters of the largest catchment in Australia.  The dam is a double curved structure and is part of the canals, rockfill dams and storage areas that make up the Gordon River Power Development scheme that generates almost 15% of Tasmania's power.

 
 


This is the tallest hardwood tree known to exist in the word.  It is almost ninety meters high!  Surprisingly, the forests right next to this reserve contain trees almost as tall as these and are being clear-felled (clear-cut) as I write.  It is unfortunate that they cannot learn from our mistakes and try to preserve more of this irreplaceable resource. 

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This site was last updated 09/04/06