Four and Twenty

Today's blog is named in honour of the ever present common blackbird. You don't see them in Queensland, but PD tells me they are a nuisance out Dubbo way.

On advice from our host at Heimat Chalets, we took the back way (B62) from New Norfolk to Mt Field National Park. The road wound through farmland along the banks of the Derwent.

We stopped at Salmon Ponds, a salmon and trout hatchery which has been operating since the 1860s. The grounds are lush with mature exotic trees and the cafe does a nice coffee.

The hatchery building:

Trout ponds (largely empty in December and January so we were lucky to see plenty of fish):

Albino Rainbow Trout:

Contrasting trees - native along the banks of the Plenty River and exotics in the main grounds of the hatchery:

The road towards Mt Field runs through a hop growing district - an oddity on the mainland and interesting to see.

There are plenty of walks of all levels at Mt Field NP and we chose to walk to Russell Falls (the easiest of the walks):

Countryside near Meadowbank Lake north of the turnoff to Mt Field NP:

Some wag was obviously bored one night:

An equal opportunity farmer:

Two of the old buildings of Hamilton: