It was the last day of our trip with James and most of our tour members. Only 9 of us would still be together for the trip to Port Arthur the next day. I was totally fresh for the trip today as I really had a good sleep due to over exhaustion after a daylong trip which stretched until 10:30 pm the day before. I was warned that Tim was a heavy snorer and I might not have a good sleep by the younger Japanese. In fact the 69 year old Japanese, Yutaka also snored quite noisily. Their thunderous snores were only affecting me briefly because I was too tired and fell into deep sleep after a short while.
Our trip for the day was visiting Freycinet National Park which is only 17 km to the south of Bicheno. It has two prominent spots, Cole Bay and Wineglass Bay which are seldom missed by tourists. We visited Cape Tourville Lighthouse at Cole Bay which is only accessible by a steep earthen road. It is an unmanned, automatic light house. There is a boardwalk built at the side of the cape as lookout for Cole Bay and the islands beyond.
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| Cape Tourville Lighhouse at Cole Bay |
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| Cole Bay |
Wineglass Bay was only a short distance away from Cole Bay and it was voted by several travel authorities as one of the world's ten best beaches. After alighting from our bus at the car park to Wineglass Bay, we were given a choice either to climb up Wineglass Bay lookout or hike up to Mount Amos. Most of us opted to climb up to Wineglass Bay lookout as it was less strenuous. I dare not climb Mount Amos because my legs' pain inflicted while hiking up Marion Lookout at Cradle Mountain had still not totally recovered. James gave a brief instruction to those who would climb Mount Amos and left them to climb on their own. James would lead us to Wineglass Bay lookout which was really not necessary as there were enough road signs on the way. Before we made the climb we were advised to use the toilet and filled up our drinking bottle from the tap outside the toilet. The water from the tap was taken directly from mountain stream and is not only safe to drink but contains a lot of nutritious minerals. I have been drinking water from the tap since coming to Tasmania because water in Tasmania is not polluted.
The hike up Wineglass Bay could be tough for those who are old and less fit as it consists of stairs made up of rocky slabs or earth. The older French lady in our group gave up half way and returned to the car park but her daughter continued on. We took almost 45 minutes to reach the lookout point for Wineglass Bay which provides the best location for panoramic view of Wineglass Bay below. We were not contented with looking at Wineglass Bay from afar and decided that we should set foot on its beach. Only eight of us went down to the beach which required another 45 minutes to reach. There were many visitors going down to the beach mostly in small groups. It was quite hot because the forest is not dense enough to shelter us from sunlight of the blazing sun. There were quite a number visitors in their swimming attires either sunbathing or swimming at the pristine sandy beach. We walked a short distance along the beach before we settled down at the middle of the beach to enjoy the rock melon we brought along. We did not have a knife so I used my finger nails to cut a circular groove round its skin before forcefully prized it open. Yes it worked and the rock melon served two purposes, quenched our thirst and provided us the energy for the hike back to the car park.
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| The Bay which shapes like a wineglass |
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| Stairs leading down to Wineglass Bay |
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| Wineglass Bay |
We did not stay long at the beach to enjoy the stunning view because we were given 3 hours for the trip to Wineglass Bay or Mount Amos. We walked up the stairs to the junction near to Wineglass Bay lookout before scaled down the stairs to the car park. We spotted a wallaby among the rocks which was not scared of us. Wallaby is really a common sight in the wild but not Wombat. We had not seen a single wombat in the wild so far. By the time we reached the car park, the group who climbed Mount Amos had also returned. They seemed to enjoy their climb judging from their smile of achievement and so were we who made it to the Wineglass Bay beach. It was a regret that those who came down after reaching Wineglass Bay lookout had to wait for us at the car park for almost one hour.
From Freycinet National Park we headed to Swansea, a small coastal town on the shore of Oyster bay overlooking the granite peaks of Freycinet National Park. There are many seafood restaurants offering oysters but we only settled for the cheaper fish and chips. After our lunch, it was all the way to Hobart passing through sheep and dairy farms. We crossed the Sorell Causeway which stretches from the western side of Midway Point across Orielton Lagoon to Sorell. Together with Mcgees Bridge they connect Sorell with Hobart via the Tasman highway. The causeway and the bridge provide a stunning view of Orielton lagoon with its wavy water scattered with small fishing boats.
Before reaching Hobart we stopped at Hobart Airport to drop off two members who would be flying back to Melbourne and Sydney.
We would still be staying at YHA Backpackers which we had stayed before. Only 6 of us who would be going to Port Arthur and Tim stayed at YHA Backpackers. Tim would be flying back to Melbourne the next day before going back to New Zealand. The three Chinese girls who had upgraded their tour stayed at more reasonable hotel but would join us to Port Arthur. We had to bid goodbye to James who had done a superb job ensuring an enjoyable and memorable trip for us round Tasmania for five days. I also had to say goodbye to our new acquaintances , Adrian Foo and his wife who would still be staying in Hobart for few more days before flying back to Perth.
We visited the food fair at Hobart's Franklin Square which was held every Friday. There were many food stalls mostly selling western cuisines. We were a bit late and most stalls had already sold out. In the end we went to the Chinese restaurant nearby to have our dinner. It was our second visit to the restaurant after our first visit during New Year Eve because the food there is good and quite reasonably prized.
Day 8
As expected our tour guide cum driver for our trip to Port Arthur was the Swiss girl who took us to Mount Wellington in our first day of travel with "under down under" tour. We had a few more new members but the tour was not fully booked. It was pity that Adrian Foo did not join us as he and his wife were still in Hobart and they had not been to Port Arthur.
Our tour started with Richmond, the historical town just 25 km east of Hobart. We visited Richmond Bridge, a heritage listed arch bridge which is also the oldest stone span bridge in Australia. It connects Hobart with Port Arthur before being replaced by Sorell Causeway. The Oldest Roman Catholic church in Australia is also situated nearby. The whole town seems not to change with time and most of the houses are single storey traditional western style houses.
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| Richmond Bridge |
I knew that Port Arthur has a lavender farm though not as big as the one in Launceston but visiting lavender farm was not in our itinerary. Due to my interest in seeing the blooming lavender in summer I requested whether we could stop over at the lavender farm for a short while at least to snap some photographs. I was really excited when Adeline agreed promptly saying that the farm was just by the road side on the way to Port Arthur historic site. There are a few plots of lavender plants all blooming with purple colour. The farm which has a lake coupled with the hills in the distance was really very scenic. There is a shop selling lavender products like soap, perfume and so on. There is also a big restaurant serving lunch and dinner to visitors to and from Port Arthur Heritage site. We did not eat at the restaurant though the restaurant is quite popular according to review because we would be taking our lunch at Port Arthur historic site.
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| Port Arthur Lavender Farm |
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| Beautiful landscaping at Port Arthur Lavender Farm |
Before reaching Port Arthur Historic site, we came to Eaglehawk Neck, a tiny bit of land which separates Tasman Peninsula from the rest of Tasmania. There used to be prison guards and dogs stationed there to guard against convicts from escaping from the Prison. Now there is a dog statue guarding the tiny strip in memory of the service rendered by the prison dogs in the past. Adeline asked us whether we were interested to snap photo with the dog statue but no one was interested. The car park outside the historic site is very big in evidence of the great number of visitors to the site. In fact Port Arthur Historic Site which is a world heritage site is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Tasmania. We were given two tickets each, one for entry to the historic site while the other one is for the boat ride. We visited the museum which contains a sizable number of exhibits mostly about life of convicts and history of the prison. From the museum we moved on to visit the garden not for convicts but prison officers. The garden is very articulately designed with plenty of strange flower-plants which I have never seen before. Next we explored the ruins of the site such as the church, prisons , the army barrack and officers' quarters.
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| Prison officers' Garden |
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| The left over of the convict's church |
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| Remains of one of the prisons |
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| The army barrack ruin |
We joined the walking tour which was free and the guide explained in detail history of the buildings at the site to give us a better understanding of its past. We had our lunch at the cafe consisting of coffee and muffins right in the former prison premise. After our simple lunch, we rushed to take our boat ride which has fixed time schedule for departure. The boat took us to explore the coastline of the historic site of Port Arthur and also the island nearby. The island was the burial ground for convicts and we had to buy another ticket to visit the island. The guide was quite humorous and we really had a good time learning the history of Port Arthur convict's past in a jovial manner.
We spent almost four hours at Port Arthur Historic Site and our last stop was the cliff formations at Tasman Peninsula. We passed by a very interesting town called Dootown where most of the houses have house-label starting with doo such as "Doo nothing", "Dr doo little" , "Doo I" and so on. Adeline was very excited pointing to each house we passed by telling us its title and the title she likes most. According to Adeline it all started with one owner who labelled his house or fishing shack with " doo I'' which prompted his neighbours to label theirs as "doo me", " doo us " and that spread until all the shacks have titles including some vulgar ones.
Not far from Dootown is the lookout point for Tasman Arch which is a big cliff structure with its central part eroded by sea water and wind to form a tall granite arch standing few hundred metres tall. From Tasman Arch we moved on to Devil's Kitchen, a granite coastline with tall cliffs and caves. Adeline wanted us to observe carefully the cliff formations before telling her why it was called Devil's Kitchen. I tried to scrutinize the rock formations hoping to see some rocks resembling Tasmanian devils but to no avail. In fact it has nothing to do with devil but kitchen. Devil's kitchen got its name from the cauldron of foaming fury normally seen at water level from the viewing platform several hundred feet above where the swells of the great Southern Ocean crash into the base of the tall cliffs.
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| Tasman Arch |
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| The highest cliffs at South Hemisphere at 300 m tall |
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| One of cliffs with its cave at Devil's Kitchen |
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| Blowhole of Tasmania |
We were a bit sad coming out from Tasman Peninsular because it signified the end of our tour in Tasmania and also time to leave Tasmania which we had stayed for eight days. We were dropped off at Hobart Airport to take our flight back to Sydney at 8 :00 pm the same day.
The 8-day Tasmania tour was really a good experience as we got to explore and see almost every part of Tasmania with its wonderful natural landscapes. It was also the first time I celebrated New Year overseas and it was at the very south of the globe, Tasmania. I also got the chance to know friends from many countries. The tour conducted by our tour operator, " under down under" created many first for me too like staying in a shared dorm either same gender or mixed gender and cooked our own meals while travelling. I surely would suggest to those who like adventure to join such tour either in Tasmania or anyway in the world. It is a regret I did not manage to visit Bruny Island to see the whale or seal and Huon Valley to visit the Tasmanian Cherry farm. Our trip to Tasmania was like a physical building and trimming trip and it is enjoyable from the beginning till the end. Au Revoir Tasmania.
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