Notes on the history of the Central Plateau

The first approach to this region was made by Lieut.
Laycock in 1807 when, with several men, he ascended the Lake River to Wood's Lake and proceeded to the Derwent along the Clyde. Thomas Toombs, a ticket-of-leaver informed Calder the surveyor, years after the event, that he had seen the Great Lake in 1815. No doubt, many such men, attracted to the wild, lonely plateau came hunting for the more elusive creatures, thought to be living there.