We arrived in Launceston and got the bus into the city. Everyone so far has been super nice to us in Tasmania. Like the South island of New Zealand. We checked into the beautiful hostel that's in a listed building. Only problem is it has no heating for the winter. We had a wander around the town. Its a very pretty little town and we went down to the gorge for a walk. Saw some pademelons and a wallaby down there, as well as some peacocks while we had devon tea. It reminds me a lot of England here. I guess the landscape is similar even if the wildlife isn't. We had to resend the forms for the tax and did that from office works. That sorted out mine, but Cannelle still had to photocopy all of the pages from her passport and get them signed by a police officer before posting them to the medicare offices to get her medicare exemption back. It never ends lol.
We took care of that in the morning and went to pick up the car. The woman told us that a lot of accidents happen in Tasmania, most cars come back damaged and people often drive without car insurance in Tasmania. Now I have no idea if this is true or not, but I know there is a lot of wildlife on the roads here (we have seen a lot of roadkill) and we were obviously still spooked by our experience of scratching up the car in Victoria. By this point they had given us our $200 deposit back but we were worried that we could knacker this car and it would cost us $4000 in excess. We bit the bullet and paid $150 each to reduce the excess to $440. At least that would be a mild inconvenience and not a holiday crippler that the $4000 would be. This will probably be the last car we hire except one for a day in Broken Hill, maybe one for a day in Adelaide (both of which we may insure) and one from Kalgoorlie to Perth. Its also the reason why we probably won't do the west coast as it will start to burn us too much in the end. Not sure we really needed it so far, but we are only half way so far so its maybe too early to judge and it definitely gives us peace of mind.
We set off at lunchtime from Launceston to head to the north east and all of the roads are windy round here with a wide variety of traffic signs. I am sure that drivers from the mainland will never have seen half of these signs there as the roads are just straight and dull. It takes a while to get anywhere and Tasmania drivers are a little crazy, so perhaps the insurance was a good idea. We decided to divert to the North and that was a bad idea as we ended up crawling along a gravel road where we only saw 4x4s. We quickly decided it wasn't a good idea for us to continue up that way as we had already bashed up one rental car. We got back on the main road and headed down to St Helens. From there you can divert into the Bay of Fires. Cannelle was starting to think that it was a lot of driving and she wasn't sure if it was going to be worth it. When we pulled up alongside these almost Philippine white beaches with their tropical (albeit cold) turquoise water and fiery orange lichen covered boulders we realised it was worth it. What a beautiful place. We spent an hour round there and then drove over to the Gardens which are even more beautiful. Its a stunning stretch of coastline and was the first time I had seen crashing turquoise coloured waves. Great start to the east coast. We wanted to blitz it to have more time for the parks in the west and as I am sitting in Hobart at the moment, we are still thinking about what exactly we will do for the second half.
The next day we drove down the coast (diverting pointlessly to St Marys as LP recommends, though we did see a poteroo and wallaby on the road) to Freycinet NP. The weather was a little overcast which was a shame, but you can still see the beautiful pink and orange granite mountains from Coles Bay. In the summer this must be a beautiful place. I think the beaches at Bay of Fires are more beautiful, but the setting here is maybe superior. We did the hike over to Wineglass Bay. It is a truly marvelous view from the top of the summit and the beach was totally deserted when we got down there and could just chill out. We considered a longer walk but the rain was coming in by this point. We enjoyed it for a bit and got back to the car to continue onwards to Port Arthur. It was going to be touch and go if we made it and there were some roadworks as well. We encountered some shitheads on the road who were abusing and swearing at us because we followed the speed limit. You get dickheads everywhere. I was just worried they may come and smash the car up at night as it was obvious where we were headed. The sunset on the Tasman Peninsula was really beautiful and we rocked into the campsite late, where we watched The Voice Australia and saw all the pademelons on the grounds. There are loads around Port Arthur.
In the morning we headed to the Port Arthur historical site. The price is now $35 but its worth it. We got our playing cards to find our historical convict in the basement. Its a nice touch and the museum is informative. We got an hour long guided tour, which we were very lucky to have an interesting tour guide for and they went off script as well. It also included a 20 minute boat trip around the harbour which was nice, though I expect them to be adding that as a separate cost soon. Going all New Zealand on us. The grounds themselves are very beautiful and it does contrast with the convict history there. Its hard to get a handle on what happened there and there is a full spectrum of opinions amongst the tour guides themselves. It guarantees you a unique perspective for your tour. We spent about 4 hours looking around the site before deciding to visit the rest of the peninsula on the way to Hobart. The remarkable cave is well worth the trip, but all the other side trips around Eaglehawk Nest are not worth it really. The peninsula itself is nice enough on its own. We swung by Richmond on the way back and the bridge is nice, but after Port Arthur it doesn't seem quite so colonial. Probably not worth going out of your way for but you may as well visit if if passing. We finally arrived in Hobart and decided that we would do some day trips to the south and west.
The hostel offered a free trip up to Mt Wellington so we took them up on it as we figured it would save us some petrol. We were driven up and the views from the top are really something. You can see out over most of the Tasman Peninsula and the islands south of Hobart. You can even see some of the mountains in Southwest National Park. Everyone walked down, but we didn't think we would have time as we needed to cram so much in. The driver told us to do a 4 hour walk on the Tarn shelf in Mt Field National Park, so we decided to abandon plans to go to the south as it looks very similar. We are concerned about stretching ourselves too thin. After Mt Wellington we went to Salamanca Place and Battery Point to see the historical parts of the city. Its less historical than I expected, but its very cute in its own way. It may be the cutest Australian city we have been to so far. It doesn't take too long to walk around. We got some expensive fish and chips at the docks and they were really disappointing. What we had had in New Zealand had been much cheaper and far better quality. After this disappointment we took the car out to MONA which is horrifically signposted as I guess they want most people to take the ferry. The museum is in a beautiful location and the Derwent river is pretty on the drive North as well. The museum is odd and like most modern art galleries mostly filled with shit. There are some interesting pieces here though and its definitely worth a look. Probably more innovative and interesting than any other art galleries we have been to in Australia. Finally in the evening we headed to Bonorong Wildlife Centre to take the night feeding tour. We paid $179 each for this but it was worth every penny. If you are an animal lover then this is a must. Just the fact that your entrance fee goes towards supporting the work they do there for rescuing and rehabilitating injured animals is enough in itself. We started off feeding the kangaroos. Cannelle was super intimidated by the bigger kangaroos, but they loved the food. We even got to witness two adult males fighting later on in the evening. We went to the wombats first and stayed with Lucy who is a wimpy wombat because she loves human contact and hasn't learnt to be aggressive enough to be released into the wild yet. They do a lot of rehabilitation of injured wildlife on the roads of Tasmania. We did not want to touch many of the animals if it had the risk of distressing them and once he realised that feeding the Tasmanian devils by tug of war was done mostly for tourists we just gave them their food. We were here to learn what they work on and to see the animals, not to touch them. Though the wombats are super cute. We fed, learnt about and observed a wide variety of animals. Wombats, Tasmanian Devils, Koalas, Frogmouths, Potoroos, Bettongs, an albino possum, quolls and the super cute sugar gliders. We learnt a raft of information on these animals in our 2.5 hour tour and it is clear that the carers really know their stuff and our carer could easily answer any question that we put to him. It was a super informative evening, a wonderful experience and a highlight of our trip. If you love wildlife then this is an absolute must. Just do it. Don't worry about the price. You will feel like it was totally worth it and be happy you invested your money in a centre and a project that is definitely worthwhile. After we drove back very slowly in order not to hit anything on the roads.
Today we had planned to do the Tarn walk, but then saw it was a gravel road and Cannelle was feeling tired. In order not to push it too much we decided to take a break and just chill out in Hobart, watch game of thrones and I could catch up on the blog. Tomorrow we will visit the easily accessible parts of Mt Field NP on the way west to Strahan. Should be able to stop at various points along the Franklin river on the way. Looking forward to the west even if most of our time will be in Cradle Mountain NP as its the most accessible. Loving Tasmania so far. Well worth the trip.
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