Today we are heading up the Tamar Valley. The plan is to do the west side today, then cross the bridge and do the east side tomorrow. On the way up towards Beaconsfield, we decided to drop in to a place called Grindelwald, which was advertised as a Swiss village. After a long and winding drive off the highway we found it - basically it was a resort attached to a golf course. They had set up a 'Swiss style' glorified shopping centre at the entrance. The shops don't even sell specifically Swiss merchandise - no chocolates etc. A real con.

So we continued on. We got a Triple Pass, which gave us entry to the Beaconsfield Mine, Seahorse World, and Platypus World - the last two being at Beauty Point, a few kms past Beaconsfield. We decided to start there then head back to Beaconsfield as this is where the free camping site is. If we don't manage all three, we can spend the night and do the mine in the morning.

We started with Platypus world, which included platypi and echidnas. We had seen platypi in tanks many times before, but the real highlight was getting up close and personal with a few very sweet echidnas that waddled around us. Seahorse World was almost as good, seeing the various types of seahorses, looking at their life cycles and breeding techniques, and finally actually getting to hold one.

It was a full and interesting day, but by the time we had finished it was getting close to four, and there really wasn't time to do the mine. So we went back to Beaconsfield and had a look around town, then settled in to a nice free camp on the oval just outside of town. Met two very nice couples from Queensland and had a good chat.