Wednesday
Unfortunately, we didn't get a huge amount done within Hobart. Being the second oldest city in Australia, it has an awful lot of history, we just didn't get much time to see it. We were moving on already, heading south to Bruny Island. After getting some breakfast, Charlotte had to try and attempt to sort out her banking problem out. This time we didn't get a call back in time and we had to move the car before we got a ticket. We gave up and hit the road. The traffic was very light and we made it down to the small town of Kettering in no time at all. Here is where we picked up the car ferry to Bruny Island. The ferry cost $33 for a return trip, which was pretty reasonable bearing in mind the Easter weekend was coming up. Our accommodation was at the opposite end of the island we had landed on so we started the trip down. Bruny Island was one of the top things to do in our Lonely Planet book and we'd looked into it before we left, so we were expecting good things from it. We were pretty pleased when we managed to get a relatively cheap caravan just a few days before, with Easter approaching. We were staying in the village of Adventure Bay, which is the point where Captain Cook first landed in 1777. We had been almost the last car off the ferry, so we were stuck behind a long precession of cars most of the way down. When we arrived in town, we found the Captain Cook Campsite and checked in. It wasn't midday yet, so we were pretty fortunate to be able to get into our caravan so early. Our caravan turned out better than we had expected. It was in need of some modernisation and a bit of handy work but was perfectly fine for our 2 day stay. It consisted of a large caravan, with a room attached to the side of it. It was all sealed up against the elements and would hopefully be pretty cosy in the evening. We had a walk planned for the afternoon but decided to get ourselves some lunch before heading out. We'd picked up some cuppa soups when we arrived in Devonport and had then completely forgotten about them. We needn't have worried too much. They didn't taste an awful lot like the leek and potato they were supposed to but they filled a small gap. After lunch we set off to the fluted cape to do our afternoon walk. It was marked in our book as only taking 2 and a half hours, so it seemed like a good one to do with half the day already behind us. When we pulled up, we were the only vehicle in the car park, so we were looking forward to a nice peaceful walk alone Bruny Island’s rugged coastline. The book also said that it was steep and there were unfenced cliffs, so we'd have to be careful. The first part of the walk took us along the sandy beach of Adventure Bay and then up into a wooded area within South Bruny National Park. Not far along the path we found a small area next to the sea where there were hundreds of stacks of stones. They were either a piece of art made by someone or something started by one person that then other passers by continued. We walked down to have a look and added our own small stack before setting off on our walk again. The path split and we continued on to an area called Grass Point, named because it is a grassy point. The path was slightly overgrown here, so we ended up losing our way temporarily. It was worth loosing though, as while we were lost, we stumbled across a couple of grazing wallabies. They seemed very comfortable with the presence of humans and they let us quite close to them. When they hopped off we found the path again and started to ascend the cape. The book wasn't kidding. The walk was very steep and took us very close to sheer cliffs on a number of occasions. To add to that, the pathway wasn't very well maintained or signposted, so some of the time, the navigation had to be pure guesswork. We stopped along the way a couple of times as much to catch our breaths as admire the view. It really was impressive and definitely worth the exertion we were putting in. After more than one false dawn, we made it to the top and were greeted by someone who had come the other way where the path split and didn't seem to have a drop of sweat on his brow. The book had told us we could only go clockwise (which we think you should do any walk, anyway) and we had, so it annoyed us people were going anti-clockwise. We had a snack at the top of the cape and then started on the path back down. This path was 10 times better than the one we had come up on. It was gradual, which meant we could maintain a decent speed and make pretty good time. We made it back to the car pretty much bang on the 2 and a half hour mark, so the book had been pretty accurate. By this time we were tired, so we popped to the small supermarket in the centre of Adventure Bay, picked up some milk, butter and a large pack of biscuits that were reduced as they were going out of date and headed home to nosh them with a cup of tea. We spent the evening in, listening to the waves crash on the beach just behind us and wrote some blogs. It was nice to have a private kitchen for once, however, we didn't really make the most of it, as we only had baked beans and pasta, due to the limited facilities on offer. When we stuck the heater on in the evening though, it definitely was cosy inside the cabin.
Thursday
It wasn't cosy when we woke up the next morning though. It was bitterly cold and for some reason, we didn't bother leaving the heater on. We quickly got it going and stuck the kettle on to get a hot drink as soon as possible. We had bought some crumpets when we were in Hobart and ate them for breakfast along with some jam, peanut butter and the locally made butter we had picked up the day before. Charlotte seems to think having peanut butter with crumpets is weird but having been brought up with peanut butter crumpets while watching Heartbeat on a Sunday evening, I think it's fine. After breakfast we set out for our second bush walk in as many days, to the very south of Bruny Island. We made our way over a very windy unsealed road that curled its way up one side of a mountain and then down the other. When we made it to the car park, there was only one other in sight and it was one we had seen when leaving the walk the day before. This walk was significantly longer than the one the day before. 14km long and estimated to take 5-6 hours, it would be a god bit of exercise before the Easter weekend. Another group had pulled up and were just getting ready to go, so we set off in a bit of a rush. We pulled away from them pretty quickly though as the path was pretty easy going. We had thought we had overheard them sayings they were doing the shorter track, so they would be catching us up anyway. We were walking along grassy paths over sand dunes that seemed to be rather overgrown. Along the first stretch, we heard an ominous rustling in the bushes. We stopped and could just make out the body of a long black snake hiding underneath the bush. We hadn't expected to see any on this walk and were surprised to see one after there had been no snake warnings in the book or at the start of the walk. We moved on, taking much greater care where we put our feet bearing in mind the path was pretty overgrown. We hadn't walked half a kilometre when a rustling caught my attention again. I looked down to see the large, black body of a snake gliding through the foliage beside my leg. I struggled not to jump back in surprise but didn't want to startle it and end up with a snake attached to my leg. We were even more worried now and annoyed at the lack of warnings as well as our own ignorance. We carried on and thankfully the oath eventually thinned out to a wide track. We were flying along and guessed we were making pretty good time. It seemed we were bending round to start the return leg and that's when we heard and Charlotte saw yet another snake fleeing into the undergrowth. We were getting used to them now though and brushed off this latest spotting. A short while after that we came upon a long sandy beach, isolated at the tip of the peninsular. We hadn't heard a peep out of anyone else, so we decided to sit down on a log, eat some lunch we had brought with us and enjoy the peace and quiet. We had breakfast bars, carrots a banana. We set off after lunch along the soft sand and entered a very thick, overgrown pathway. It was so bad we had to lift our arms up to avoid getting scratched to shreds. Thankfully, we reached a second beach, where we didn't have to worry about attacking foliage. About half way along the beach, we were just lamenting the lack of seals in this part of the island, when Charlotte let out an excited squeak and pointed towards the water. It wasn't seals but a large pod of what looked like Dolphins (which we now think might of been killer whales), casually swimming past out in the calm bay. We just stood aghast while they swam by, enjoying the experience of the majestic animals. Even after they had swam off we still stood there, hardly able to believe we had been in that right place, at that right time. Had we not had lunch when we did, they would have swam past unnoticed by anyone. We found the pathway off the second beach, still amazed. The walk back along the peninsular was through quite thick wooded areas and the surface was very uneven. We passed a trawler anchored up that looked like it was stocking up from a number of fish or oyster farms that were dotted along the coastline. Eventually, the pathway eased a bit and we took in one final beach before making it back to the car park. We had completed the walk in just over 4 hours, so despite the stop for lunch and wildlife spotting, we had made pretty good time. We were surprised to find the car still next to us that belonged to the group who had said they were going to do the short walk. They had either got very lost on the short track or had changed their minds on the way round. Just before departing we spied a post about 10 feet up the pathway at the starts of the tracks. It was the registration book that walkers log in and out of when they do walks in the area. In our haste to depart before the other group that morning, we had completely bypassed it. It was lucky we had made it back safely and without any snake bites to show for it. We started off in the direction off home. Along the way we made a small diversion to South Bruny lighthouse, which is perched up in a headland looking out towards the vast and untamed Southern Ocean. It was a steep walk up which was probably made harder by the fact we had just completed a 14km walk. The views were good and it's rather pleasing to look across the water and know there is no land until Antarctica. We followed the pathway back down to the car and found a solitary possum scavenger for food next to a bush. He seemed pretty tame and responded to my held out hand. We guessed that far too many tourists gave him food. We still had a couple of things planned for the day so we left him be and headed off. We almost had to drive the full length of the island to get to our next stop, which was the Bruny Island Cheese Company. They are located on the northern part of the island, not far from the ferry to the mainland. We wandered in the shop and had a look around and then waited in line to do some cheese tasting. We tagged on the end of a couple of people in front of us and tried a nice Camembert and a plain cheese that had been flavoured with olive oil, peppercorns and chillis. They were both really nice but not what we were after. Once the man and his son had gone, the lady behind the counter went back to the beginning and we tried the 2 hard cheese on offer. The first one was very plain and probably an entry level cheese. The second one had a bit more flavour though and we decided we'd pick up a little bit of that for some supper. After getting our cheese, we stowed it in the glove compartment and drove a little further south to the Bruny Island neck. It is a narrow strip of land that connects the northern part of Bruny Island to the southern half. About half way along is a car park that you can stop in and a wooden set of steps that take you up to a viewing platform. From there we could see 360 degrees around the neck and easily take in the sea leaping against the beaches either side of us. On our left, the waves were crashing in noisily having built up energy out in the ocean and on our right was a nice tranquil bay lapping gently. We spent a few minutes here admiring the view and then walked down the steps back to the car. There was also a penguin lookout at the base of the steps but we skipped that as we were too early and we had already seen penguins up in Burnie. Finally, it was time to head back to the campsite and rest for the evening. Along the way we did stop at the supermarket to pick up some crackers to go with our cheese and admire a statue on the beach. It was a globe with a whale inside but it had a couple of major shortcomings on it. Somehow they had missed off New Zealand and Tasmania. We didn't bring it up though and headed home. When we got back we showered and settled in front of the tv in an attempt to get to grips with the rules of Aussie Rules Football as the season had just begun but the channel it was on wasn't working, so we had to settle for family fortunes.
James and Charlotte
No comments:
Post a Comment