The rain stopped, well almost

We left Kim in the middle of a rope bridge over the river Franklin.  Happily she made it back to safety without mishap and we ended the day’s driving at Strahan in an overpriced and third rate camp.  The longest running play in Australia takes place nightly at a tiny open-air theatre right by the dockside.  ‘The Ship That Never Was’ has a cast of two, but what it lacks in numbers it simply makes up from the audience.  Amongst others, Mike was co-opted for a minor role, simply to act vomiting into his hat at periodic intervals.  As a result, Mike is definitely not considering a new career in acting!

Next day, after yet another night of rain, we joined the ‘Eagle’, a large catamaran, for a cruise on the Gordon River.  We’d been told by various folk who we met along the way that it was an experience not to be missed.  The weather was appalling as we left, throwing it down, and we wondered what sort of a day we were going to have with little visibility through the rain streaked windows.  But as we left Strahan in the distance the weather improved.  Sunny it was not, but the skies sort of cleared, visibility improved and for once it stopped raining.  Until we reached Sarah Island when again the heavens opened.  Five minutes later the rain suddenly stopped and we all trouped ashore (with a certain amount of trepidation).  Our guide, who turned out to be one of the cast from last night’s play, took us on an entertaining and informative walk around the former penal colony, pointing out the ruins that were the only clues to the island’s previous role.

We were fascinated as much by the way that nature had reclaimed the island.  New growth dominated; trees, shrubs, grasses, ferns and especially mosses were everywhere.  It was an extraordinary landscape.

The entrance to the large natural Macquarie Harbour is through a narrow passage over a bar known as ‘Hells Gates’, a term that was given by the convicts who were sent there.  Once through the passage into the harbour, life was ‘hell’.  The route in was torturous and we were not surprised to learn that it had been the scene of numerous shipwrecks with many lives lost.  By comparison, the Gordon River was calm and serene with the tree clad hills reflected in such a way that it seemed their image was perfectly inverted.  Impenetrable rainforest encroached over the water and mosses draped every surface.  True rainforest indeed.

Lunch on board was particularly good, with Tasmanian smoked salmon a key feature.  We celebrated with a bottle of Tasmanian wine, only later trying to decide what it was we were celebrating.  Was it the cruise or the fact that the rain had stopped?  Somehow it didn’t seem to matter.  Tasmanian Atlantic salmon (a bit of a misnomer) is farmed, it’s not wild.  We passed dozens of these farms in the clear waters of Macquarie Harbour.

Returning ashore to Vin Rouge, we found a group of people discussing the various merits of our set up.  Plenty of questions were asked and views exchanged.  Then a young chap arrived who had waved to us on the road the previous day.  He was also in a Land Rover Defender and came over for a chat.
The next day started, as usual, with yet more rain.  Then it brightened and the view ahead was softened by steam arising from the warm bitumen as the sun made its appearance through the clouds.

We arrived at the village of Waratah.  Deposits of tin and copper were found there in the late 1800s.  The ample water supply was used to power the mining machinery and one of the first electrical generators was installed.  It’s all gone now; there’s just an attractive waterfall to show where industry had sprung up from nowhere.

A short drive took us to the coast, to Cape Table, noted for its stunning views and the amount of tulips and poppies that are grown there.  In Stanley “The Nut”, a volcanic plug, dominates the skyline.  We took the lazy way up on the chairlift and walked the 2 km trail around the top.  The views were indeed picturesque, white sandy beaches stretching into the distance, deep blue sea and rich pastures inland.

We wandered into a large shed where wooden boats were being built and restored.  The boat builder, a certain Mr Sims (close!), obviously an enthusiast and a friend of Gryff Reece-Jones, chatted with us for ages, explaining his preference for huon pine as the timber of choice and how he approached the task of restoring old boats.  It was all very interesting but we needed to drag ourselves away to make a quick visit to the Tarkine Forest.

The Tarkine is listed in the top ten of the world’s wildernesses.  It is remote, but some of it is accessible by road.

We touched upon a few areas which were certainly unspoiled and seemed to be devoid of people.

However, as it was reaching the end of the day we decided that some link with civilisation would be the preferred option for overnighting and returned passing a splendid view of the Nut to Rocky Cape.

A most convivial evening was spent with a couple touring in their camper trailer.  Can’t recall what we discussed but the wine was fine.

Boats and Water

Sunday 17th March dawned bright and cold.  It’s been crazy weather ever since we arrived in Tasmania.  Last Tuesday it was 39 degrees, today it barely reached 10 degrees.  At least it wasn’t raining as we set off.  First stop was the apple museum at Huonville.  Kim’s mum, Molly, picked apples in Kent as a youngster and seeing the orchards, apple sorting and coring machinery, and examples of traditional apple varieties brought back many memories.  John too had stories of childhood scrumping in and around the Kent orchards – but we won’t go into that!

Then it was on to Dover on the Huon River.  We’d been hoping to catch up with Dick and Pat.  Dick and Mike knew each other back in the late 60s and 70s when Mike’s main hobby was sailing and Dick was building his boat.  Dick and Pat set sail from the UK some fourteen years ago and have been enjoying life around the world ever since.  But first it was lunch in the old post office, now a restaurant with a superb fire blazing away as the autumn chill reached the southern latitudes.

After lunch everyone made it safely on board the yacht Irene, where Dick kept everyone amused with tales long and short, of nautical mishaps and adventures whilst Pat miraculously produced tea and cakes from her galley.

We returned to Hobart via the picturesque coast road, and completed the evening with yet another Guinness – well, it was St Patrick’s Day.
We’d wondered how the convicts coped when they first set foot on Van Diemans Land in the early 1800s.  To find out more we visited Port Arthur, a penal station established in 1833 for repeat offenders from all the other penal settlements in Australia – in other words, the worst of the worst. We found the place to be fascinating, not at all what we imagined.  Port Arthur pioneered rehabilitation and whilst some men were broken, many left as skilled artisans.  However, life must have been extremely tough, but one wonders how it would have compared with their bleak lives in England where many of their ‘crimes’ were born of desperation.

The drive back took us through acres and acres of burned forest.  The recent bush fires had taken their toll and the smell of burning remained in the air.  Not only trees and livestock were lost, but homes too.  It was sobering to see the damage caused and the evidence of lost property and livelihoods.

John and Molly returned to Brisbane and the X-Trail was returned to the hire company.  Kim, Mike and Vin Rouge hit the road once again.  Actually, they retraced their route and spent a couple of delightful days with Dick and Pat aboard Irene.  They agreed that there’s no better way to relax than to be on a boat.  A gentle motor up the river to shop for a few provisions managed to take most of the day.  Bliss!

Vin Rouge was overdue for a service and whilst that was being done we took the catamaran ferry to MONA – the Museum of Old and New Art in Hobart.  Now we’re not entirely art philistines, but do consider that art should be inspiring and the artist at least somewhat talented.  Let it be said that we were unimpressed and renamed it the Museum of Obscene and Naff Artifacts, a triumph of hype over substance.  Nuff said?  However, the boat ride was pleasant.
It rained most of the day and most of the night.  And it did the next day and the day after that, and the day after that.  Camping in a roof top tent is fine and we’ve adapted well.  But too many days of rain start to become tedious – and damp.  However, in the true British wartime spirit, we ‘carried on and had a cup of tea’.  Frequently.  Sometimes the tea was replaced with something a little stronger.

Still, we made it to Strahan on the west coast of Tasmania.  The route, part of which was over a narrow unmade road, made for interesting and challenging driving.  The scenery, when it was visible, was stunning.  Tree covered mountains, streams and waterfalls, giant ferns and a plethora of plants we’d not seen before.

We managed a couple of walks and discovered an interesting bridge that just demanded a photo.

So let’s leave Kim in the middle of the bridge over the river Franklin– until the next blog.

Chocolate and Beer

At the end of the day we found ourselves at a place with the delightful name of ‘Snug’.  The Snug Post Office was appropriately named, but the Snug Supermarket didn’t quite ring true!

Our camp site was probably one of the best we’d experienced, just a few yards from the beach set in a wide bay.  Waves gently lapped on the golden sand as the sun dipped towards the horizon.  It was so warm we were tempted in for a swim, most unusual for Mike who generally likes the water close to tepid before a foot is tentatively offered.  A swim was certainly refreshing, followed by a hot shower and a G&T with toes tucked into the sand.  It was difficult to think of a more perfect setting.

Snug wasn’t always so perfect.  On 7 February 1967, a massive bushfire swept through the town leaving 62 people dead and nearly three quarters of the buildings destroyed.  Black Tuesday, as it became known, was described by Prince Phillip as ‘the most vivid’ of his recollections of visiting disaster areas.  There’s a simple but moving garden and a memorial that outlines the shape of a devastated house, together with plaques describing the event and the parts played by key people in the recovery.

Wednesday 13^th March found us driving a Nissan X-Trail instead of the Land Rover.  Kim’s parents flew down from Brisbane to spend a few days with us in Tasmania and as Vin Rouge takes only two we hired a car and an apartment.  It was novelties all around with a different car to drive and real beds to sleep in.

The plan was to spend most of our time in and around Hobart, but a mandatory visit to the hop fields was high on the agenda as John and Molly both picked hops in their early years in Kent.

The sky was clear as we drove to the top of Mount Wellington (4,170 feet), but as elevation is gained, so the temperature drops and at the peak the wind chill made it feel close to freezing.  The views were great, although we didn’t stay very long.

Then it was away to the Cadbury factory where we discovered that although Australian chocolate tastes different to British chocolate, the recipes are the same.  Apparently the difference comes from the milk and the sugar.  Oddly, British Cadbury chocolate seems to be preferred, even amongst the Aussies.

Mike doesn’t like chocolate so next day’s visit to a brewery was more to his taste.  As he put it “we’ve checked out the hops, now we can check out the final product”.

The Cascade Brewery is Australia’s oldest and has a chequered history.  The founder, one Peter De Graves, after three attempts, finally made it to Tasmania in 1823.  He started a timber business, progressed into ship building, milling and finally brewing.  Something of a ‘character’, PDG left a mountain of debt when setting sail clandestinely from Ramsgate.  Finally tracked to Hobart, he spent five years in jail where he not only designed the new brewery and his house, but also a new jail.

One perk for the workers was that they could drink as much as they liked at the end of each day – for ten minutes that is when the tap remained on the whole time.  Start and stop times were signalled by the ringing of a bell.  This tradition remained in place until 1996 when the Health and Safety police finally put an end to the practice.  Workers now receive cases of beer to be drunk at a more leisurely pace.  They probably get much the same in quantity but the fun has gone.  Now there’s a familiar story!

We’ve noticed that Australian towns like to show off their botanic gardens.  Hobart is no exception and has very mature gardens that include everything including a rather elegant and beautifully presented conservatory,

rose gardens, parterre, avenues of trees, a television programme linked vegetable patch, a Japanese garden, a sub-antarctic plant house and a flower clock.

Although the capital of Tasmania, Hobart is quite a small city.  However, Saturday’s Salamanca market is large.  Stalls line each side of the street for nearly a mile and sell everything from fruit and vegetables to handicrafts, clothing, food and drink, jewellery, art and flowers.  Kim and her mum browsed enthralled until the heavens opened and we were forced into the nearest pub.  The rain lasted quite a while.

Pondering over four empty glasses seems to be a good place to stop this blog.  Tomorrow is Sunday, St Patricks Day, perhaps the weather will improve and we can celebrate with another glass of the black stuff.

Tassie Tripping

Sunday 10th March dawned sunny, bright and warm.  With no great rush we packed up camp and set off.  Our first stop was Campbell Town.  Along the main street were lines of bricks, each brick giving details of the first convicts transported to Australia.  By today’s standards most of their crimes were petty.  Sarah Watts, who was sentenced to seven years for stealing silver teaspoons, arrived in Tasmania on the good ship Edward in 1834, aged 27 years.  We saw references to children as young as seven being deported.  Some of the convicts made good and became respected citizens, forming the early administrative, trading and building developments of the colony.  It all made for a very interesting morning’s study.

Another bridge and another story.  Campbell Town’s Red Bridge was built using penal labour and is the oldest brick arch bridge in Australia.  They made the bricks first from local clay, some one and a quarter million of them.  Built in 1838 the bridge has required no maintenance since, a testament to the workmanship.  They used a neat trick for the construction.  The bridge was built over dry land, then the Elizabeth River was diverted to flow underneath it.

It was then on to Oatlands to see the only surviving windmill in the southern hemisphere.  It’s still used to mill flour, although now catering mainly to tourists.

There’s more than a hint of the English countryside about parts of Tasmania.  Dry stone walls abound in places where granite is abundant.  Sandstone was quarried extensively and there are lots of buildings, from the roughly finished vernacular to elegantly Georgian classic.  Willows, chestnut, poplars, oaks and pine trees grow in orderly lines, planted as windbreaks.  Roses flower in abundance and we bought delicious raspberries and strawberries from a roadside stall.  Even hop fields are planted.  Then a corner is turned and suddenly it’s Australian gum trees and scrub.  It’s all most disorientating.

So we visited the Nant Distillery that makes single malt whisky and powers its milling stones by water wheel.  It would not be out of place in parts of Scotland.

On again to Bothwell where the weather once again turned to rain and we set up camp in record time just as the drizzle turned to a downpour.  It was a miserable night, cold and wet.  The rain increased as the evening wore on so we took to the tent for an early night.

Next morning we met up with two other couples, Andrea and Chris who were camping in a very substantial tent and Andrea’s parents who use a camping trailer.  Stories of their travelling adventures, together with quite a lot of humour and repartee meant that our departure was, as usual, fairly late.  We compared notes about the weather and tactics used in the race for the free laundry (we won).

We’d heard gunfire during the early morning and saw the results of this loaded in the back of a ute.  Venison would soon be on the menu in the local pub.

We paid a quick visit to the Bothwell Golf Club, which claims to be the oldest in Australia being founded in 1822, but found the players to be rather wooden.

On again to Bushey Park and the hop fields.  Kim’s early years were spent in Kent and hop fields were a familiar part of the countryside.  There seemed little difference in the scenery half a world away, perhaps with the exception of the hills.

Quite by chance we came across a delightful little cafe, The Possum Shed, where we indulged in coffee and cake.  Calories galore but what the heck, we’re travelling!

The ‘platypus in residence’ is named Flossie but she failed to make an appearance.  Instead we relaxed as the river chuckled by, forming little rapids over the stones and brambles ripened in the hedgerows.  On such a relaxed note, it’s time to finish - for a little while.