We stopped off at the Little Blue Lake in the morning. It was a crazy lake, very blue as the name suggested, but a chemical blue. It turned out to be an old mine site, and the water has a high mineral content. Didn’t seem to upset the frogs though, they were happily croaking loudly.
Next we drove through Derby, a mountain-biking town. Stopped on the side of the road to take a photo of the big fish rock.
We took the Mathinna Plains Road and ended up in the Ben Lomond National Park. Of course we drove up the Jacob’s Ladder there to the very top. It was crazy – a dirt road with hairpin bends and the whole road was shrouded in fog. Thankfully, the weather had cleared a bit by the time we went down the hill. It was quite wintery at the top! We had a look at the camping area and had lunch there but were completely swarmed by mosquitoes outside so we didn’t stay there the night!
We drove from there to Launceston, as we both wanted to pop into Kmart. We turned into the carpark and the car started making some horrible noises! We went to the shop, then drove over to the other, quieter side of the carpark and Josh took apart the wheel. There was a problem with the passenger-side wheel-bearing. He put it back together and made sure it wasn’t going to break further, then made a plan to camp at the closest freecamp near Launceston so we could come back in the morning. It was a place called Lilydale, and it was a very packed rest area on the side of the road. There were a couple of waterfalls there, but it was only good for an overnighter really.