The day after visiting Port Arthur, we headed south and had a lovely breakfast on the "Margate Train" the last passenger train to run in Tasmania, now converted to a small tourist stopover.
We did a scenic drive around the countryside and Brian spotted some old grey fergie tractors near an apple stall we stopped at, and just nearby were some cute Highland cattle and a farrier shoeing a draught horse.
We came back to Hobart and had fish and chips on the dockside, had a look around Hobart( cities are not really our thing) and headed back over the Derwent river bridge .
On the way back to the motel we passed back through Richmond that we had seen previously but found "Old Hobart Town" a small scale replica village of what Hobart looked like in the early 1800's, it was brilliant, so much detail has gone into creating it.
The next morning we headed off north to travel up the east coast.
We came to a beautiful old stone church at Buckland, it was closed for repairs but we had a wander around it and the enclosed graveyard, so many young people just never made it in those early years, so sad.
We drove through lovely winding hilly countryside, often with beautiful rivers and creeks on one side of us and ocean on the other.
We came across the "Spikey Bridge", a convict build bridge, but unknown why the vertical spikes of rock were placed there. The notice says that it was to either prevent stock jumping over the sides whilst crossing or that it was just a folly of the engineer or builders.
Freycinet National park was our next stop as we wanted to walk the track to wineglass bay lookout. As we entered the national park we got amazing views of the mountains.The treck up to the lookout started off easy but soon became quite a hard climb of steps that just kept going and going.. I had a few stops along the way as I am just so out of condition, but I certainly wasn't alone . The climb was definately worth every gasping step.
What a totally stunning view of Wineglass Bay it was. As we came back down to the car park, we had a little friend right near us while we had a quick lunch from the car.
We continued noth up the coast until we came to St Helens, where we stayed the night, had dinner at the local RSL and met a lovely couple Don and Jill from Launceston who like us were doing a touring trip of Tasmania. We had so much in common and we stayed and chatted for hours.
The east coast of Tasmania is very picturesque and we have enjoyed it, so different from our dry inland home.
will continue the journey soon,
Take care
Cheers.
Jane.
Spectacular view of the bay - well done, gold medal for both of you.
ReplyDeleteThanks Lynda, the view was certainly worth it,
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Jane. :-)