YOU LITTLE RIPPLER MOUNTAIN VALLEY, TAS

Platypus are exceedingly difficult to spot, you can sit on the mosquito-infested bank of a lake for hours scanning the surface for the tell-tale ripple of this most unusual of animals, the duck-billed platypus, but alas, it’ll inevitably just be the play of the wind on the water or a surfacing trout. Set on a 61-hectare private nature reserve is Mountain Valley Wilderness Holidays, where you can stay in cosy cabins with open log fires to explore the surrounding forest of old growth white gums in the shade of Black Bluff Mountain. At dusk take a guided platypus tour of some of the creeks that flow through the property, giving you a great chance of seeing this bizarre creature. With poisonous barbs on its webbed feet, a furry coat like an otter coupled with that defining duck-like bill, it was famously thought to be a hoax when a specimen was sent back to the British Museum by Captain John Hunter in the late 18th century. “It naturally excites the idea of some deceptive preparation by artificial means,” English zoologist George Shaw wrote in 1799. It’s just one of two types of monotreme on the planet, a mammal that lays eggs; the other including the four species of echidna. While you’re at Mountain Valley keep an eye out for Tasmanian devils, too, which like to visit the cabin verandahs at night. mountainvalley.com.au