Allow a minimum of five hours for this activity. One hr drive each way, 20min to 5 hour walks and on the way home you can visit the Holy Cow restaurant for an icecream. How to get there: From Tin Dragon Trail Cottages turn right onto the Tasman Highway (A3). Drive up over the hill out of Branxholm. Continue along the Tasman Highway through Derby, Moorina to Weldborough (26 Km), or turn right into the Mt Paris Dam Rd (C425) just on the outskirts of Branxholm and travel to Welborough by this gravel road (19km). From Welborough you can continue on the A3 to the Little Plains Lookout (6.8 km from Welborough)—turn into Lottah road to view the lookout, or you can continue on to the Anchor road turnoff (17km from Welborough, A3).
Forestry signage on Lottah Road
On Lottah road take the left-hand forks in the road till you reach the Lottah junction, 7.6 km from the Tasman Highway turnoff. When you reach the Lottah junction turn left onto Poimena Road and continue till you reach the abandoned town of Poimena (11.5 km from the Tasman Highway turn-off). Alternately you can turn left into the Anchor Road (to Goulds Country) turnoff (17 km from Welborough on the Tasman highway). The Anchor Road has signage to direct visitors to Poimena. Although there are some gravel stretches, Anchor Rd is a better maintained road than Lottah Road. Less than 1 km along the Anchor Rd is a turn-off to the right to the Halls Falls car park then another 4 km further along is a small car park for the Anchor Stamper’s – a short 10 min walk. Continue past Lottah (8 km from Tasman Highway) and take the Poimena Road till you reach the abandoned town of Poimena.T he Blue Tiers is our favourite camping area. We love that it isn’t crowded and its clear flowing steams. I love that the environment is so varied, from wind-swept alpine shrubs, stressed tea tree, myrtle, pepperberry, open grass, eucalypts,
The Goblins (children’s) walk
Great location for a family picnic
marshy peat moss. There are more walks than you could possibly do in a few days, so we keep going back. I like the walk from Poimena to Welborough the best. The reward after a four-hour walk? A great meal and cold cider at the Weldborough pub! But you need to be organised for this walk, with one car at each end; well at least if you don’t want to turn around and head back up the hill (and up, and up, and up). Signage at Poimena describes the seven formed tracks and track are mostly well marked. There’s great interpretation too, with stories of the old miners.
The efforts of the ‘Friends of the Blue Tier’ keep the tracks maintained and keep up the pressure for the precious timbered slopes of the Blue Tiers to be protected from logging. The Blue Teirs, called Meenamatta, has a long Aboriginal history. The first Europeans came when tin was found and in 1878 Blue Tier Junction was a small town with one pub, two hotels (temperance), blacksmith, butcher, three general stores and several cottages. It was a company town. All but one of the buildings were owned by the Marie Louise Mine, with only a few private allotments being taken up after 1883. Despite a name change to Poimena, the town didn’t recover from the 1890 depression. Finally the school house was removed, too, in 1954. Many abandoned mining holes are now filled with water
Old mining equipment can still be seen
The understory is magic too
Beautiful old myrtle trees
In the early 1900s and continuing through to the 1950s several families used the sparse areas to run cattle and sheep. It was in 1958 that the Blue Tier was claimed as a forest reserve, and by 1997 more than 5000 hectares had been included to conserve the flora, fauna and rich heritage. Poimena is a ghost town now, so poking around is fun. You can almost feel the bustle of the old school and the cattle sale yards. See if you can find the old school lav! But do be careful of the more recent long-drop… you may hear an alarming sound each morning around 6:30!