Tasmanian Adventure Part One

Saturday 18th July – Saturday 25th July

Saturday 18th

Was an early start on the first day of our long awaited trip to the Australian state of Tasmania! The alarm clock went off at 0530am and we slowly got ourselves together before getting our bags together and headed off to flag a taxi down. It took a little while and we eventually got one the guy was an absolute numpty hadn’t a clue how to drive sat across the lanes on St Kilda road and wasn’t sure what to do at the lights!!! We missed one skybus then nearly the other as he took 5 minutes trying to count out the change. Anyways made it on the 0700 skybus to the airport having already done the online check-in it was just a matter of dropping the bags off before taking the 59 minute flight to Hobart.

We arrived to a sunny winters day in Hobart and took our second cab ride of the day with a English bloke called ‘duckie’ who was great at impressions a very good Billy Connolly in-fact amongst others. So we arrived at the hostel around 10ish and dumped the bags in the luggage store before heading out the world famous Salamanca markets. We had a little look around the markets which was all out doors stretched along Salamanca place. It was like a hippy / 2nd hand shop / craft fare / local food type stalls which was great, there was live music, people playing with foot bags and loads of nice food vans. We looked around half before taking a break and getting some food in a local café and a much needed coffee before finishing off looking around.

We spent the afternoon at the hostel catching up on sleep and unwinding before going out for fish and chips from one of the floating chippies around constitution dock which was really nice. We then watched the new Sacha Baron Cohen film ‘Bruno’ which was both hilarious and shocking at the same time just like ‘Borat’.

Sunday 19th

After a good 10hr sleep we woke and went and got some beans on toast from a local café in the city. We the spent an hour of so in the Tasmania National Museum learning about the islands aboriginal people and the Tasman tiger (which is sadly extinct) amongst other things. We had a walk up around around battery point before finding the Irish pub called ‘Irish Murphy’s’ we’d seen the previous day and got some very nice food and a couple of pints of Guinness whilst discussing plans for the rest of the trip.

The plan for the rest of the night was to watch the final of masterchef Australia only to find out when arriving back at the hostel was that people in Tasmania only got channel 10 with a special TV adapter which they didn’t have at the hostel, gutted!

Monday 20th

Yet another 10hr sleep and a quick start in the morning as we picked up our hire car from a little way down the road. Back at the hostel after a 10 minute pack-up we were on our way to the Cadbury factory in Claremont. We arrived and Corinne was like an excited little school girl nearly skipping to the entrance. Now there was no factory tour but we did have a nice talk from a lady called Shirley and a DVD of what goes on in the factory. There was free samples a plenty and we got to see the 10kg bars that they sell, we also spent a little in the shop $40 worth lol and tasted some other choc’s in the visitor centre.

After the chocolate was packed up in the car we were meant to head up the top of mount Wellington to take in some amazing views of Hobart but the weather was absolutely miserable. So we went to the Cascade (Tasmanian beer) brewery and had some gorgeous pumpkin soup surrounded by the forests and mountains, Wolfie then got a few different types of beers and a free mini cool bag.

We found a woollies in town and stocked up on the food for when we headed off into rural Tasmania out of mobile phone range and across some beautiful countryside arriving in white beach caravan park arriving just before dark. Corinne immediately put the heater on and the electric blanket for the bed!

Tuesday 21st

Not the quickest start today sometimes trying to get Corinne out of bed in the morning is like trying to raise the titanic or a hungry gorilla. Once we were up and about we made a 10 minute drive to the historic Port Arthur site. Its where a majority of the convicts where sent and especially the bad ones or those considered to be for the mental institution. We started of the tour with a cruise around Caernarfon harbour and a stop on the isle of the dead. On the isle there are around 1100 convicts and free people buried, we read some of the headstones and heard stories about some of the occupants and the convicts who had jobs as grave diggers.

We then had a look around the rest of the historic town taking in the old penitentiary, commandant’s house and the nutter asylum. The prisoners were actually quite lucky compared to nowadays the whole area was very picturesque and has lots fresh sea air! The afternoon then went a bit dull and started raining not heavily just a little but that really fine rain that gets you wet without realising. So it went dark and then we made a couple of calls home before going home for tea.

Wednesday 22nd

We started off the day exploring the Tasman peninsula and started with a drive to the remarkable cave (a huge see cave that runs up into the cliffs up which waves and the tide flow. The view was amazing from the top of the cliffs and the waves were pretty impressive the huge winter swells from the cold southern ocean.

Next stop was fossil bay were Wolfie found 350million year old fossilised shells and a sharks tooth, we spotted a couple of yellow tailed black cockatoos and there was a stinky blowhole! Final stop was the Tasman arch and absolutely HUGE cliff arch and hells kitchen which used to be a sea cave before the roof collapse some years back.

We then spent a little time driving to our next destination Freycinet NP were we had booked in at the big 4 campsite in coles bay!
Thursday 23rd

Much to Corinne’s disgust we left the warmth of the nice cabin and set off for the NP entrance. After a brief stop at the visitor centre we drove the remaining 2km to the car park and left the car for an 11km walk called the wineglass / hazard beach circuit. After signing in for the day walk we left and started the climb up to the lookout for the national park and the world famous view of wineglass bay. It took nearly an hour to reach the summit and the higher we got the more we were pestered by cold winds.

The reward of the view was breathtaking though second only on the trip to that of the sunrise on the volcano on Maui. We could see way into the national park but more prominent was the crystal clear blue waters and white sandy beach of wineglass bay voted among the top 10 beaches in the world. We stayed for a little while before the wind got a little to cold and so we started our decent to the beach.

Around 45 minutes later we hit the sand and dropped the bags and relaxed for a little while. One of the incentives to get Corinne to go walking was mini bite size Cadburys chocolate bags we she tucked into whilst relaxing on the white sand.

Then there was the flat 3km walk on the Isthamus trail which started in forests were little blue fairy wrens and willy wagtails we chirping and dancing around before turning into wetlands with frogs croaking in chorus. We reached hazard beach in no time and it was in such contrast to wineglass bay was dark coloured sand dull and scattered with sea debris, but it was a 2km walk to reach the track again so it was kind of fun to walk up the beach. Once we were a little away from the beach in some shelter we found a place to stop and eat out chicken butties’ and the rest off our lunch.

The final part of the walk was a 6km trek along rugged coastline and dense forest till we reached the end path we had earlier used to climb for the view of wineglass bay. It was an amazing walk and well worth it. When we arrived back in the car park there were red necked wallabies around looking for a free feed!

Friday 24th

It was a bit of a quite day with a little driving and not much really to see except the huge amount of road kill that’s all over Tasmania. We did however stop at the lighthouse in Freycinet NP in the hope of seeing migrating whales but we had no look again though the view was pretty cool!

Late in the afternoon we arrived in Launceston and grabbed a few bits from the shops, had a hot chocolate and some bits for dinner that night before checking into a holiday park a little outside the city.

Saturday 25th

After leaving the holiday park we set off for a little early morning wine tasting, first up was ninth island which was very nice although the were a little big tight on the amount of wine they poured for tasting, but they had a nice chardonnay so we bought a bottle. After finding the next place shut we went to another winery call Rosevears were the tasting was good and the wines amazing. We bought one of the white wines called a gewuertztraminer (a German grape) and a pinot red wine.

After the wine tasting we had a game of mini golf on a little bit of a water logged course which Wolfie won by 3 strokes. Final stop in Launceston was the Cataract gorge in the city we took a ride on the chair lift before walking back to the car.
The rest of the plans for the afternoon failed to materialise as the honey farm was shut and we missed the last tour of the mole caves on the way to cradle mountain.

We arrived at our posh accommodation around 4.30ish and checked in taking full advantage of the facilities and having a nice dinner and some drinks in the bar ( its called the cradle mountain chateau and the only reason we could afford it was that we had a discounted room). We spent time after tea writing postcards curled up on couches drinking wine in front of the log fire.