Margaret River to Pemberton, heart of the forests

12th September 2014

We ventured inland today into the heart of the hardwood forests.  Pemberton is located between 3 National Parks, Gloucester, Beedulup and Warren.  The town was built in 1913 for the purpose of felling and milling the surrounding Karri trees.  The forests have been felled twice since then.  Karri is a hardwood and naturally pest resistant so was used for railway sleepers on the Indian - Pacific railway which connects Sydney and Perth.  Huge trees of 600 years old were felled initially, then the regrowth about 50 years later.  Harvesting in still going on, nowadays most of the timber goes into flooring.

In the morning we took a heritage tram ride on one of the old forest railway lines.  This was somewhat disappointing and overpriced.

Pemberton Heritage Tramway

This afternoon we had a look at the Gloucester tree.

John up the Gloucester tree

The tree is one of the few survivors from the original forest and is still used as a 'fire tree'. Metal pegs have been inserted into the trunk all the way to a platform 53 metres up in the canopy.  The fire spotter can climb the tree and see over the shorter trees to spot smoke in the bush fire season.  This tree is still in use today. John and I both had a climb, but only to about 3 metres!