Cradle Mountain, Tasmania - a fairy-tale setting

By SUSAN BUCKLAND

Tasmanians tell you that Cradle Mountain is the centre of gravity. Sooner or later people are drawn to the serrated mountain in the northwest to marvel at its wild beauty.

As an afterthought they may tell you about the "gingerbread house" called Waldheim, tucked in the shadow of the mountain, and leave you wondering how a German name found its way into a rugged Tasmanian wilderness of forest, lake and mountains.

Intrigued, I set off in a four-wheel-drive vehicle from Cradle Mountain Lodge, a favourite retreat of Australian singer Olivia Newton John, said the manager.

The sealed road had become a narrow dirt track by the time I arrived at the house called Waldheim. Towering native pine forest surrounded the modest building like a magnificent shawl. And on a sign near the door was written: "This is Waldheim, Where there is no time, And nothing matters."

The thought-provoking words, I discovered, became a motto for Gustav Weindorfer, a nature-loving Austrian who fell in love with the region when he first visited in 1909.

He wanted to share the splendour of the place and began by honeymooning there with Kate, his Australian bride. She found the area as enchanting as her young husband and, in long skirt and boots, became the first woman to climb Cradle Mountain.

Her admiring Gustav told her: "This place is beautiful, Kate, and must be preserved for all people for all time." Whereupon she bought 81ha in Cradle Valley and the couple moved in to the dwelling that Gustav built from native timber. He soon added a chalet for friends.

Only the hardiest of their acquaintances would have made the journey along the gravel track to Waldheim, and winter would not have been the time they came calling.

Life was a challenge whatever the season in the remote wilderness home of the Weindorfers. Gustav carried in supplies on foot, up a 15km track. Packhorses and a motorbikes were later to ease the journey. But there was no escaping the harsh winters, when the water frequently froze in the pipes overnight.

Only one other curious traveller found his way to Waldheim when I was there. In the silence of the surrounding forest, we imagined the isolation felt by the couple in their lovely, but lonely, environment.

After Kate died of illness, the loneliness for Gustav must have been unbearable at times. After two particularly harsh winters he confided in a friend that he had become afraid of the wild animals that were surrounding the house, crazed with hunger. But until his death, 16 years after Kate, Gustav Weindorfer continued to lobby the Tasmanian Government to save the region from the rape of native timber that was occurring on all sides and to preserve it as a national park.

He lived to see 64,000ha between Cradle Mountain and Lake St Clair come under Government protection, but died 40 years too soon to see it become a state reserve in 1971. Eleven years later, the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park, and adjacent Wild Rivers and Southwest National Parks, were distinguished with World Heritage status.

A replica of Waldheim - German for "forest home" - has replaced the original, which had become derelict. The shingle-roofed house is now a small and fascinating museum.

The Weindorfers also would have been gratified to know a Weindorfer Memorial Service Committee holds a service every New Year's Day to commemorate the crusade by the man from Austria and his Australian wife to preserve the region's beauty for all people for all time.