CAPTURING TASMANIA’S WILD WEST
Four photographers revel in the beauty of Tasmania’s wild and remote Western Arthur Range as they walk in the footsteps of renowned wilderness photographer Peter Dombrovskis.
MY LEGS ARE SCREAMING and my back is aching from the weight of my heavy pack as I clamber up the steep, rocky track to the saddle between Mt Orion and Mt Sirius, in Tasmania’s remote Western Arthur Range. Finally, Lake Oberon comes into view. Impossibly beautiful, this mist-shrouded body of water hangs weightlessly between the mountains, as though it’s f loating in the sky. Upon seeing it the feelings of foreboding I’ve experienced since ascending into the range from the Arthur Plains below immediately give way to a complete sense of calm.
I realise what a profound moment this is for me. I have spent years imagining what it would be like to see this scene. Ever since I f irst viewed Peter Dombrovskis’ famous photograph of the lake (see above), taken in 1988, I’ve felt compelled to visit this incredible place, not only to witness the rugged beauty of the ancient landscape but also to pay respect to the late Dombrovskis, one of Australia’s greatest wilderness photographers.
In Dombrovskis’ image, three pandani (giant grass trees), relics of Gondwanaland, strike their way into the sky above the craggy peaks of Mt Pegasus. Layer upon layer of mountains puncture the clouds and the deep blue waters of Lake Oberon hang as if suspended between the steep, rocky slopes.
LAKE OBERON IS HIDDEN deep in the Western Arthur Range, in Southwest National Park, about 90km south-west of Hobart. The range, which cuts above the surrounding plains like the serrated edge of a saw blade, is only 30km long. Despite its relatively small size, it is an impressive tangle of 22 major peaks, 30 lakes and countless crags, cliffs and tarns.
It is protected as part of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area, which covers about one-fifth of the island state and is made up of a series of national parks, conservation areas and reserves.
Matthew Flinders provided the f irst documented account of the Western Arthur Range, which he sighted during his circumnavigation of Tasmania aboard the Norfolk in 1798.
“The mountains which presented themselves to our view in this situation, both close to the shore and inland, were amongst the most stupendous works of nature I ever beheld and it seemed to me are the most dismal and barren that can be imagined,” Flinders wrote. “The eye ranges over these peaks, and curiously formed lumps of adamantine rock, with astonishment and horror.”
Carved from quartzite, the jagged peaks certainly are a sight to behold. Rising abruptly from the button grass plains, they jut into the sky like pillars. Studded with glacial lakes, the landscape features spectacular evidence of glaciation, including expansive moraines and hanging valleys. It’s a wild and isolated place that’s remained relatively free of human interference.
The dramatic scenery of the Western Arthurs attracts about 400 walkers to the range each year. Last January I was one of them. With fellow landscape photographers Dylan Toh, Francois Fourie and Luke Tscharke, I set out to experience the majesty of the Western Arthur Range and to try to capture its beauty through my lenses.
We planned a six-day hike along part of the Western Arthurs Traverse, a 72km track that loops through the range from Scotts Peak Dam.
Widely regarded as one of Australia’s most challenging tracked multi-day walks, the steep and tricky traverse is known for its arduous ascents, vertigo-inducing descents and punishing terrain.
Inspired by Dombrovskis’ photography, our aim was to reach Lake Oberon, the jewel in the range’s crown, before spending several days exploring the nearby peaks and then returning via the same route.
This would give us a good chance to photograph the lake, as well as around Mt Sirius and Lake Cygnus, an area that is famously shrouded in cloud for three out of every four days.
WITH A MIXTURE OF nerves and excitement, we began our journey at the Scotts Peak Dam car park. Weighed down by packs laden with provisions, camping equipment, cameras, lenses and tripods, we set off on the boardwalk through the scrub towards the button grass plains that would eventually lead us to the looming peaks.
The boardwalk quickly gave way to a boggy track that we squelched along for hours. Some sections were so muddy we found ourselves knee-deep in thick sludge that tried to suck the boots off our feet with every step.
Our mud-hopping slog across the plains was a slow and exhausting start to the journey, but the plains eventually opened up, offering us spectacular views of the peaks. It was motivation to push on.
As we closed in on the Western Arthur Range, it became easy to see the effects of glaciation on the terrain. Moraines cascade down the f lanks of the mountains and large quartzite boulders litter the area, having been deposited by the receding glaciers of the last Ice Age some 11,000 years ago.
From the foot of the range, the track ascends up Alpha Moraine, which rises almost 800 vertical metres, providing a relentless, heart-pounding climb for bushwalkers. I trudged my way along the track through glacial scree deposits, past giant boulders and around impressive rocky outcrops.
AS WE GAINED ALTITUDE, our view back down the moraine towards Lake Pedder became more and more impressive. During the late 1960s, renowned photographer Olegas Truchanas, who was Dombrovskis’ mentor and close friend, captured poetic photographs of the beautiful but doomed Lake Pedder. He spent years campaigning with his camera to save the natural glacial lake from its eventual f looding after the Tasmanian government announced its plans to construct three dams in the Serpentine and Huon rivers, inundating Lake Pedder, to generate hydro-electricity.
During his campaign, Truchanas introduced many people to the beauty of remote south-west Tasmania with his lectures, slideshows and photographic collections of the area. Although he wasn’t successful in stopping the dams – Lake Pedder was f looded in 1972, and is now a 242sq.km impoundment and diversion lake contained by the three dams – his efforts left an indelible mark on Dombrovskis. In fact, Dombrovskis’ famed 1979 photograph Morning Mist, Rock Island Bend played a pivotal role in halting construction of the highly contested Gordon-below-Franklin Dam, which would have been located further north.
Truchanas and Dombrovskis are two of many photographers who have used their cameras to capture the beauty of the Tasmanian wilderness and campaign for its protection (see page 81). Throughout their careers, both photographers produced incredibly personal interpretations of the rugged and dramatic wild landscapes of south-west Tasmania, and neither had the benefit of mass capture that digital photography allows today. They were limited to a number of sheets of slide film only and slide f ilm is an unforgiving beast, because light cannot be manufactured nor subjects manipulated.
Ironically, it was the f looding of Lake Pedder that opened up access to Southwest NP and the Western Arthur Range via the construction of Scotts Peak Road. Thanks to the road, it now takes seven days rather than three weeks to complete a full traverse of the range. This means it is easier for photographers – including us – to capture the beauty of the south-west, which will hopefully help to ensure its protection.
Inspired by Dombrovskis’ photography, our aim was to reach Lake Oberon, the jewel in the range’s crown, before spending several days exploring the nearby peaks.
THE FIRST RECORDED ASCENT of the Western Arthur Range was by a party led by George Augustus Robinson in 1830. They climbed the impressive 1119m-high Mt Hayes from the northern inlet of Bathurst Harbour. However, it wasn’t until 130 years later, in December 1960, that a full traverse of the range was completed. Local bushwalkers Pat Conaghan, John Elliot and Barry Higgins from the Hobart Bushwalking Club carved a route through the notorious Beggary Bumps that finally connected a series of rocky razorback ridges along the length of the range.
Until late 1965, the peaks and lakes were uninspiringly named in a numerical and alphabetical sequence. Motivated by a spectacularly clear night sky, members of the Hobart Walking Club, led by Tim Christie, put forward a proposal to rename the range’s features after the planets, their moons and constellations.
“The clouds rolled away abruptly as they had three days before, and high above reared the dark prof ile of the mountains, black against a brilliant starlit sky,” Christie wrote one evening, while high in the range. “Who could deny at that moment that the night sky was every bit as much a part of the south-west as the rocks and the scrub and the button grass plains?”
The proposal was accepted by the Nomenclature Board of Tasmania and resulted in the names that are used today, including Mt Orion, Mt Sirius, Lake Oberon and Lake Cygnus.
ONCE WE REACHED THE top of Alpha Moraine, we could see the grey, rugged peaks of the Western Arthurs stretching out to the horizon, and the high tarns glistened like jewels.
As the ice volume of the last Ice Age decreased, subsequent younger ice advances carved out discrete cirques that now appear as a series of natural amphitheatres and hanging valleys pocketed between towering cliffs and sharp quartzite mountains. These land formations make bushwalking a challenge, and the track is marked by steep ascents followed by even steeper descents down slippery rock-strewn slopes. Harsh winds keep alpine growth stunted, and the tangles of tree roots that cover the ground in the valleys can very easily trip you up.