A weekend at Cradle Mountain was a long overdue escape from the hustle and bustle of Hobart. I really wanted to go in winter to see snow and clouds and mysterious rain, and I’m really glad I did. Nothing especially exciting happened but it was absolutely spectacular and beautiful. I walked around Dove Lake in the rain, through Ballroom Forest and the occasional bit of rainforest, and then across some bush. Most exciting were all the wombats, and the pademelon joey – so unbelievably cute. I also saw some traces of Tasmanian devils: they push their prey into the ground while eating it, so bits of the animal get crushed into the mud.

On Sunday morning I got up at 6am to see the moon and stars and a dusting of snow, and set off to catch the sunrise at a rainforest waterfall. I got about 10 seconds of sun before a snowstorm set in. Overnight the park had turned into a picturesque winter wonderland, with lichen-covered trees frosted thickly with snow.

Up towards the summit of Cradle Mountain it got snowier and snowier until everything was black and white. I was falling up to my thighs in snow, occasionally crawling on all fours – the serious people had snow shoes and crampons – before finally turning back and retreating to the emergency hut. The cloud blocked out everything below, cutting us off from the world like a dream. I was blinded by the snow and had started seeing stars, and the huge footprint holes glowed with a pale, alien turquoise light. Occasionally the cloud would lift enough to reveal the jagged peaks of Cradle Mountain, when everyone stopped and gazed in awe. And then it disappeared and we returned to the pure and magical land of black and white.