Launceston

As the tyres I had ordered had arrived at the Honda dealer in Launceston, we rode down to collect them this morning. However, they wanted mega bucks for changing them, wouldn’t do a deal for three, and were a bit up their own arses, so we took them to do ourselves. But not before we had a look around the city, which was surprisingly small. Tiny actually, although it does sprawl quite a way.

We had planned to ride with Hannes again today, but he had a flat rear tyre which he had managed to reinflate and was on his way to a local garage that he uses. So we met him there. There was no nail or anything visible, so we reckoned it could be a valve problem, and that’s what it turned out to be. The tube inside had started to slip and the retainer nut was too tight, so the rubber had started to rip away from the valve stem, and lose air. So that worked out cheaper for him than a new tyre.

And as we were there and it had started to rain, we got the mechanic to fit our tyres too instead of doing them ourselves. 

However, they didn’t seat my tyre on the rim correctly, and the beading bulged a bit in one section, so when I rode it away it rubbed. But they sorted it out and now it rides well, and doesn’t slide on dirt because it has some grip. Hurrah.

By the time we’d finished with all that, the rain had stopped and the sun was out, so we reverted to Plan A and went to the Cataract Gorge which is about 2kms outside the city centre but still within Launceston.  It’s on the lower section of the South Esk River which flows into the Tamar River - the same old Tamar River that flows under Batman Bridge further upstream and out into the sea at Low Head. It flows through a very steep sided gorge here, which is not navigable as it’s full of boulders. 

The river used to be much deeper though and have a greater flow but was harvested for energy production, using the daily flow of the river to provide water for generation. An 850m tunnel  supplied water from Deadman’s Hollow, dropping straight down the hill to a power station, where it turned turbines.  By today’s standards, output was a bit weedy, with 5537 litres per second entering the turbines at the Duck Reach plant, and producing 1 megawatt of electricity. But this was between 1895 and 1910, but as the demand for electricity grew, particualrly when an electric tramway was built in Launceston, and an increase in capacity to nearly 2 megawatts, it still couldn’t cope. However, it carried on doing its stuff until the 1950s when a newer and bigger plant and dam took over elsewhere. The buildings became derelict but reopened in 1995, on the centenary of it first opening.

The chairlift which now spans the gorge is the longest single span chairlift in the southern hemisphere. We didn’t go on that but we did wander across the Alexander Suspension Bridge, which swayed with every step. And it wasn’t just to do with all the food we’ve been eating. 

The little teahouse near the bridge was very quaint, an Edwardian wooden affair with a verandah and a whole gang of peacocks and peahens strutting around. There were some peachildren too (peachicks? Not sure what they’re called) but we couldnt find them. The peacocks and hens have apparently become very bold and pinch food of tables, as Nadine found out when one pecked her carrot cake. 

Everybody knows that peacocks are spectacular and that they show off their feathers and strut around crowing.

But the peahens (lady peacocks) are really pretty too, something that I’ve never really noticed before. OK, so they’re not as colourful but their feathers have very subtle patterns marked out in browns, greens and greys, and blacks.

We’re  staying at the same place again tonight, so that means we can go back to the boozer we found last night. Good grub, and walking distance home; how good is that?