Devilish Tasmania

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For a small area, Tasmania sure packs a lot in. We should be several inches shorter from all the hiking we're doing. The southeast quadrant of the island is loaded with islands, peninsulas, bays, cliffs, crashing surf, turquoise water and fine white sand beaches, and the capital city of Hobart. It's quite a menu.

In Australia's early years, when Mother England was sending convicts out by the shipload, Tasmania made a fine spot for some of the most hardened of characters. There was impenetrable forest, the natural barrier of the sea to prevent escape, and the insatiable economic urge to chop down trees using the free labor of strong, captive men. The first serious penal colony was set up in 1821 in the west, on Sarah Island in remote Macquarie Harbour. Nine years later a new and ingeniously brutal area was established in Port Arthur (no relation!) on the Tasman Peninsula near Hobart. This settlement lasted for many years, expanding and increasing in sophistication, including medical facilities, an insane asylum (solitary confinement didn't always successfully teach the error of one's ways), churches, and military and civilian settlements.

To prevent escape, a “Dog Line” was established along the narrow Eaglehawk Neck. A collection of particularly vicious dogs, chained at intervals to prevent them from killing one another, could rip to shreds any convict trying to flee to freedom.

In the More Current Crimes Dept, Japanese whalers, subsidized by the Japanese government, continue to hunt and slaughter whales in the Southern Ocean despite an international ban and the whales' endangered status. They say they're hunting for “research purposes,” but thousands are killed and curiously wind up on Japanese dinner plates. Greenpeace is working to change that. In addition to educating the people of Japan, which they claim is working to decrease the market for whale meat, they chase the whale-hunting ships around the ocean, shooting graphic photos and video, creating sea-spray to obstruct aim, etc. We learn that the Greenpeace ship Esperanza is docking at Hobart for a day, so we go to contribute our support and tour around the ship.

Then it's back to the countryside for us. We actually climb up and along the edge of that cliff, 900 feet straight down to the water.

Uh-oh, Mitcho was here. There are hundreds of cairn towers constructed of smooth, water-worn rocks. Of course we have to balance a few more.

We hike to South East Cape, Tasmania (and Australia's) southernmost point. We try to squint to see Antarctica. To the west the next land is South America.

Back in Hobart, we're extremely fortunate to have clear weather for our trip up massive Mt Wellington with its volcanically-formed granite spires and boulder heaps. We have a perfect 360-degree view overlooking the city of Hobart, the mountains and lakes to the north and west, the jumble of lands rising in Storm Bay to the east and south.

At our camp spot on national park land on Freycinet Peninsula, a Bennetts Wallaby happens along to offer advice.

A Taste of Tasmania

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With temperatures hovering above 100 humid degrees, we hear the southern island state of Tasmania calling us. We'll visit the rest of Victoria in the Fall when it's cooler. The ferry from Melbourne makes the 14-hour trip at night. We're sorry to sleep through most of it, but it does mean we're ready for exploration first thing in the morning. Tassie is by far the smallest of Australia's states. It's only about twice the size of Vermont. We don't mind making fewer trips to fuel stations!

What a difference 600 kms closer to Antarctica makes. Suddenly we're back in long sleeves and blankets at night. Our energy for hiking returns, whether it be along a cliff edge or a deserted beach.

On the rugged west coast we happen upon Australia's National Wave Surfing Championship Competition.

A bit of a history lesson: When England could no longer send her convicts to the American colonies following our war for independence, lawbreakers served their sentences in derelict ships off England's coast. When numbers exceeded capacity, the problem was solved by transporting undesirables to that newly discovered, harsh land on the other side of the world. Because of its remoteness and dense forests, Tasmania made an ideal penal colony for the worst of the offenders. In the name of Civilization, virtually all of the Aboriginal people who had lived here for 40-60,000 years were wiped out. Convicts were put to back-breaking work cutting down massive trees.

Most of the island was temperate rain forest before the English arrived in the early 1800s to “improve” it by clear cutting for timber and grazing pastures. As in North America, tempers run hot between the greenies who want to preserve the remaining old-growth forests and the loggers who see the dollar signs in all that wood. Picture the giant eucalypts, the largest flowering trees on earth, being reduced to wood chips. Picture the loss of diverse habitat for our fellow creatures. Picture the increase in greenhouse gases. Since money seems to be what talks, we can only hope that the value of the tourist dollar will exceed that of the wood chip export revenue.

Enough pristine wilderness remains to fulfill our animal encounter desires. We are surprised at how unconcerned some of them are by our presence. This is the first spotted quoll we've seen. Marsupial, of course.

On the coast we watch little penguins come ashore in the evening after a day in the ocean. Their chicks, waiting at the burrows in the rocks begin calling as they grow impatient. “Mom...? Dad...? ...I'm hunnnnngrrry....”

Shearwaters, also known as mutton birds, migrate from here to Alaska each year. They lay their eggs in burrows in sand dunes, and now the chicks await the nightly return of their parents. We're waiting, too, shivering in a wild wind. At about 9 pm the adults swarm in by the hundreds, swirling and diving over our heads. What a sensation, though too dark for photos.

In the evening at Cradle Mtn National Park, who should come trundling by but this grass-munching wombat. I even took videos!

And of course the ever-popular spiny echidna, rooting and snuffling up ants on our hiking trail. More videos. He even tries to work his snout under my hip as I sit on the ground.


A vast area of south-central Tasmania has been preserved as a World Heritage Area. There are glorious hikes through mountains, around glacially carved lakes, along cliffs, in mossy rain forests beside waterfalls.