The views are magnificent around the area centred on the township of Plenty in the Derwent Valley, but at this time of the year the deciduous trees are lacking foliage and there is a grey-greening colour across the landscape. The visuals are comparatively dull.

 

Reid’s cherry orchards are the backbone of Plenty. Finally I walked around their most western cleared paddocks.

 

I took a last look at the river before heading towards ‘civilisation’, the railway line and the main road.

 

Sighted near a private home, I thought the densely flowering Magnolia tree, pictured below, was a rich sensual delight.

When I reached the railway line over the tiny Plenty River, I looked down and listened to the burbling water flowing into the Derwent River.

The railway line sleepers over the Plenty River were rotten and impossible to walk over safely, so I exited to the main road, crossed the road bridge and then, through the row of trees on the right in the following photo, I entered a new paddock covered in fruit trees.

I circled an orchard until I could clamber over a broken barbed wire fence that was squeezed between two poplars. Alas – my new jacket suffered a tear in the process.  Beyond was the trainline.

Around the corner of the railway line as I walked westwards into the distance, I left Plenty.  The day was overcast and gloomy, and I was walking with a heavy heart because access to the river was impossible.