Styx Valley - Tasmania's Valley of the Giants - stock photo

The lifeblood of the forest, the Styx River runs a tea-brown colour, thanks to the fields of button grass upstream. Home to some of the most impressive trees on the planet, the Styx Valley has been the site of an ongoing conflict between environmentalists, who have proposed the protection of the site as a national park, and supporters of the logging industry. One of the environmentalists' arguments, as well as the environmental benefits, was that a tourism-based economy would be more beneficial for the local economy than logging the area.