My visual diary 2020: Tasmania in Two Weeks in Summer

[melanie.ylang]

I haven't shared much here (I'm a regular at mu-43.com), but thought some of you may enjoy seeing photos from my recent visit to Tasmania - it is a stunning island, taking the best bits of southern Australia and cramming them into one easily-managed road trip.

We took our vehicle on the ferry from Melbourne, NW across the top from Devonport to Stanley, then SSW from Burnie to Strahan, ESE across to Hobart, S to the southernmost road, then N up to Hobart and through Richmond and the Midland Highway to Launceston and Devonport.

I shot with a Panasonic GX9 and a GX7, and a modest selection of non-pro native lenses; all editing was done with Snapseed on phone or tablet.

To make viewing easier for friends who don't use social media, I uploaded to Pixieset for the first time, and have been very pleased with the result. Here's the link: https://preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com/tasmaniajanuary2020/

As there's no narrative with the album display, if people are interested, I could include some text about the places we visited in following posts.

Cheers,
Melanie

 

[tonyturley]

Lovely images, Melanie. Looks like a great adventure.

 

[drd1135]

I was amused by your sudden distraction with that beautiful Corvette.

 

[Bobby T]

Excellent set. And that white Land Cruiser

 

[bluzcity]

I enjoyed the set. Thanks!

 

[jyc860923]

I'll just say this: post more often!

 

[MoonMind]

Thanks for sharing!

And also thanks for providing an entry point to Pixieset - very interesting as a (paid) alternative for photo sharing ...

M.

 

[kyteflyer]

Wonderful trip, great work, would love to see some explanations of places you went to.

 

[melanie.ylang]

I was amused by your sudden distraction with that beautiful Corvette.

I'm usually distracted by interesting cars, but actually...it's not a common old Corvette, it's an Australian-made kit car called a Perentti! The owner had brought it over on the ferry from the mainland and was cruising around the island with a modern black Nissan Z-something. What a life!

 

[melanie.ylang]

Excellent set. And that white Land Cruiser

What, no love for our beige Pajero (Shogun/Montero)?? The Land Cruiser was pretty nice though.

 

[melanie.ylang]

Thanks for sharing!

And also thanks for providing an entry point to Pixieset - very interesting as a (paid) alternative for photo sharing ...

M.

At this stage I've only used the free version of Pixieset. As I understand, there's a limit of 3GB for unpaid accounts, which was plenty for sharing this project, but I'll have to delete it eventually when I want to showcase more.

 

[Bobby T]

What, no love for our beige Pajero (Shogun/Montero)?? The Land Cruiser was pretty nice though.

Oh, the Pajero is definitely a cool rig. But, I had an 87 Land Cruiser for many years. So the old Land Cruisers always get my love.

Are you guys overlanding and camping/sleeping in the Pajero?

 

[melanie.ylang]

Oh, the Pajero is definitely a cool rig. But, I had an 87 Land Cruiser for many years. So the old Land Cruisers always get my love.

Are you guys overlanding and camping/sleeping in the Pajero?

Not this trip - we made a platform and tried sleeping in it once before, but we prefer to have a tent we can leave set up for day trips - ultimately we found that less bother. And my partner had just had shoulder surgery - you may have noticed the bloke in a sling - and it would have been pretty uncomfortable for him.

 

[melanie.ylang]

For those who would like some narrative to go with the pictures, I'll post some general descriptions of each separate page of my gallery in individual posts commencing below (the pictorial link looks the same for each, but goes to the relevant page of the gallery).


Day 1: We disembarked the ferry in Devonport at dawn, after a harrowing night in which I was nightmarishly seasick, and drove to Burnie for supplies, then on to Boat Harbour Beach (first 3 photos) for a stroll.

We made camp at Peggs Beach in national park south of Stanley, strolling the beach and enjoying views of 'the Nut', which is the standout landmark of the area.

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com

 

[melanie.ylang]

Day 2: Highfield Historic Site, Stanley.
To the west of Stanley is the historic site Highfield, an early settlement homestead built in the Georgian style, which housed the family of parents and 15 children, and stone outbuildings. It was restored in the 1980s, and is managed by the national parks service. The $12 adult entry fee was money well spent, and this was one of my favourite sights of our trip.

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com

 

[melanie.ylang]

Day 3: Montezuma Falls Walk
Our friend suggested a walk to Tasmania's tallest waterfall, Montezuma falls, south of Rosebery on the west coast. I am neither keen on walking nor waterfalls, but agreed anyway and reluctantly plodded the ten kilometres in the cold - I don't know where summer went! By the end I was aching, and I took mostly rubbish photos, so it wasn't a very pleasing day.

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com

 

[melanie.ylang]

Day 4: Tullah lake and Macquarie Heads
At Tullah, between Burnie and Queenstown on the west coast, there's a lodge on the lake which was formerly used for mine workers, but now provides tourist accommodation; with the weather turning rainy, we were glad to not be camping in wet tents! Our one night stay turned into two, and I managed to rise early enough on our last day to get some lake photos and breathe in the post-rain foliage-scented air.

Bush camping at Macquarie Heads, near Hells Gates west of Strahan on the west coast, was a highlight. The council-run campground was grassy, with secluded camp sites, and the beach was only a short walk (or drive) away.

Our campsite was visited by tiny pademelon wallabies with half-grown joeys bouncing around their mothers at dusk like something from a Winnie the Pooh story, and crashing around in the shrubberies after dark.

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com

 

[melanie.ylang]

Day 5: Strahan Cemetery, and Hogarth Falls Walk

Strahan Cemetery enjoyed beautiful harbour views, which was just as well because many graves were overgrown or badly in disrepair! Which made it just my kind of graveyard to visit.

One of my favourite parts of our trip was the easy, short walk into Hogarth Falls, which begins at the People's Park in the Strahan township. The park was a popular recreational reserve from early settlement, later featuring a brass band on Sundays, and becoming a location for the caravan park (later relocated west of the town). The walkway is mostly flat, and keeps pace with a shallow, pebbled stream, heading up to a modest fall - which I didn't get any photos of that I want to share.

We ended the day at Ocean Beach, just north of Strahan.

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com

 

[melanie.ylang]

Day 6: Wilderness Railway Rack and Gorge Tour


Everyone we spoke to who had done the Wilderness Railway tour in the west told us it was an absolute highlight, so we booked the half day rack and gorge tour. Our restored steam train with reproduction carriages left Queenstown at 9am, travelling into the mountains. The unique aspect of this railway journey is the track: in order to travel over steeper than usual grades, the Abt system, using a rack and pinion cog system between the main rails, was installed in the steeper sections (a maximum of 1:12, compared with the usual 1:40)

Midway a sequence shows the turning-around of the engine for the return journey at Dubbil Barril, by two train attendants using a hand-operated turntable. As you can imagine, this is quite a remarkable feat of engineering and maintenance!

The train makes a number of stops to refill with water, and there are activities for passengers, such as learning to pan for gold, and whiskey tasting.

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com

 

[melanie.ylang]

Day 7: Hamilton
One of our most memorable experiences in Tasmania happened in Hamilton, northwest of Hobart. We arrived in this quaint historic village mid-afternoon and heard about a lady who sometimes opened her garden for wood-fired pizza, cooked in the oven she built herself.

It was a delight to be welcomed into Christine's soothing garden to eat delicious pizzas! She used wipe-clean ingredient choice cards - you ticked whatever toppings from it you liked, and it cost a very reasonable set price for a decent-sized pizza.

We enjoyed it so much, we ordered another round to take away for next-day's meals, warmed on our camp skillet. Christine liked us so much, she made us a fruity dessert pizza to finish!

Tasmania January 2020

Photo collection by Precious Ruthless Captures

preciousruthlesscaptures.pixieset.com