The annual Tasmanian Craft Fair was once again, from our point of view, a roaring success.  Packing everything back into the truck, we had very little room for anything else.

We drove to Melbourne and caught the overnight ferry to Devonport, then drove on to Deloraine.  Deloraine is a delightful town on the banks of the Meander River, just about 30 minutes drive south-east of Devonport, which hosts the Tasmanian Craft Fair.  Most of the heavy lifting is done by the Rotary Club of Deloraine and assorted volunteers from the district.  If ever there's a must-go-to craft fair, this is it! Not to be missed by foodies - the artisan food movement in Tasmania is booming.

 After a four day fair we were keen to stretch our legs, so headed off for Cradle Mountain National Park.  It had, we discovered, snowed the night before.  I hadn't packed for this weather.  Mike had, of course. We did a couple of walks through the most astonishing moss and lichen covered paths and headed for warmer climes.  Strachan wasn't exactly warmer.

A short detour to Trial Bay netted us some lovely photos of the Tasmanian Waratah.

After a night in Strachan, we found room in the truck to fit a board of reclaimed Huon pine which is destined to become our hall table, but the prospect of boating up the Gordon River in a howling gale and rain didn't entice.  So only one night there (a beautiful place and worthy of a longer look) and we took off for Queenstown.

The colours, lines and textures of corrugated iron structures always has my attention.  Wonderful holiday shacks at Lettes Bay.

What an intriguing town Queenstown is!  So much history, so many places to visit and so little time.  It had also snowed on the nearby mountains we discovered the next morning, so spent some time with the Mount Lyall Railway and Horsetail falls. 

Mindful of the need to catch the ferry the following day we headed over the mountains in rain, sleet and hail, to Burnie. 

The trip from Burnie to Devonport is not long, so we amused ourselves at the Bass Strait Maritime Centre for a couple of hours, then found ourselves a gin distillery, just across the river from the ferry terminal. A great way to finish the trip.