Yesterday's blue skies and sunshine all gone and replaced by cloud and rain! Again! It was extraordinary that the one day we could see Cradle Mountain was the best day to do so!

After packing up we walked the Leven Canyon circuit. The first bit was OK, a short uphill walk to a platform, hundreds of metres up, perched out over the Leven River racing down the valley hemmed in by its steep sided canyon. Then the walk became a staircase. Narrow, though not high, steps wound their way down the mountainside, twisting this way and that. After just on 700 of them, we thought we had to be almost on the canyon floor but another lookout showed us to be only half-way down towards the river. More spectacular sights of the canyon and of the previous lookout disappearing into the cloud above us. The last leg was a steep uphill back to the carpark. We saw the Leven River again as it passed through pastures and then again as a wide slow waterway as it entered Bass Strait at Ulverstone.

Preston Falls was only a short walk from the road and added another 80 steps to today's tally…

And so on to Penguin where we had spent a night close by at the beginning of the trip. The Big Penguin on the Esplanade where we had naturally taken photos, is now decked out in a Santa suit - so naturally more photos.

With only tomorrow to go, we have parked ourselves in a council campsite in a little village called Forth., not too far from Devonport and the ferry back to the Big Island.