Four decades on, has the Franklin River and those who fought to save it been forgotten?

Early morning on the Gordon River, which winds its way through the cool temperate rainforest of the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers national park. Photograph: Jaime Plaza van Roon/The Guardian

Jeni Wallwork’s recent journey down Tasmania’s Franklin River was wild and treacherous but the 72-year-old trusted a splash of karma would get her through.

“My raft with four others capsized on the first day and we were stuck underwater in the washing machine of a rapid for what seemed like a long time,” she says. “I thought about my mortality in those seconds … but should’ve realised that the river wouldn’t take a protester!”