As much as these two rain-deprived Californians enjoyed the constant cloudy wet weather that greeted us during our first week on the inaptly named Sunshine Coast, it was almost a relief to be back on the road again and heading south to different climes. Cescy and Richard joined us in their car for the first part of our journey, so they could show us the village of Iluka where they lived for ten years before deciding to retreat north again. The drive there, going down the two-lane A1 highway in heavy rain with 34 wheeler juggernaut trucks like small trains – locally known as “B-Doubles” – breathing down our necks, was fairly fraught, and we eventually lost sight of our companions, not catching them up again until we found them exercising the dog in a small park on the outskirts of Iluka. But by then the rain had stopped, the sun was peeking through the clouds, we easily found The Iluka Motel, and we were able to relax and enjoy this little settlement well off the beaten track.
Richard told me how they originally found the place when, many years ago, their sailboat developed engine troubles as they were working their way up the coast against the prevailing wind, and they were rescued by a passing local fisherman who towed them into the harbour for the price of a round of drinks. This, we are coming to realise, is fairly typical of the neighbourly attitude of the ordinary Aussies who are always ready to stop and have a friendly chat. For supper that evening, we ate one of the dozen or more variants of the good old fish and chip supper offered at the same bar, Sedger’s Reef Hotel, where that salvage bill had been settled, and my bro’-in-law assured us it had not changed much over the years; the raucous chat among the fishermen was still fairly unintelligible as the beer flowed freely and the customary odour of deep fried food floated through from the kitchen. The building itself that looks like it was once a warehouse or similar, had seen better days, but the atmosphere of bonhommie was thoroughly beguiling and the schooners (half a litre or about a pint) of Toohey’s New also went down pretty well!
This land is full of new and for us unusual birds, and we are constantly grabbing for camera and camcorder. One unfortunate consequence of this occasional frenetic activity was the loss of a very nice lightweight pair of sunglasses as we took our early evening stroll around the village, partly to see the house Cescy and Richard once lived in. When we realised they were missing, we immediately retraced our steps along the well manicured grass verges quite confident in their retrieval, but it was not to be. As we had seen hardly anybody else around, we had no reason to suspect a felonious local and can only assume that one of these exotic birds we had been photographing had jackdaw-like instincts for shiny objects lying on the ground – a “laughing” kookaburrah perhaps?
The next day we said our adieus to sister and bro’-in-law at the Main Beach, and as I walked across the finest sand ever to dip my toes into the incoming surf, Celine chatted up a “Genuine Aussie Hippie Surfing Dude” – his words – named Russell, an arboriculturalist by trade when not playing in the waves. Soon we found ourselves on the road heading south again towards the strangely named town of South West Rocks. We started back on the A1, which is undergoing major roadworks to bring it up to near-motorway standards. Much of the land it crosses is floodplain territory and the work involves trucking in enormous quantities of ballast to provide a stable base for the roadway, plus the construction of numerous bridges to cross the many waterways running down to the sea from the nearby Great Dividing Range (the many estuaries of these same waterways also make for a wonderfully diverse coastline.) As a consequence of all this work, the A1 is a mixture of country lane, diversions and part-finished dual carriageway; so in many ways it is much more interesting to drive along than the new fast open motorway it will probably be one day, though not for a good while yet it would seem! When we reached the old town of Grafton, historically the first river port on this part of the Australian coastline, we turned inland, and after a pit stop at biker-friendly Coutts Tavern in Coutts Crossing to satisfy the inner man and woman with a couple of rather sloppy Harry’s Pies, we headed towards the hills.
From then on, the drive was sublime. Lots of cattle farms slowly gave way to sub-tropical forest as the road twisted and turned up the hills; eventually, at its highest point we came to more open farmland and pine forest. Everywhere it seems, the ubiquitous Eucalyptus grows in one of its many variants. We crossed a bridge of rusting reinforced concrete beams across the pretty Nymboida River. At Dorrigo we stopped to look more closely at an enormous collection of soot-blackened steam engines and old rotting railway carriages waiting for the proposed Railway Museum to see the light of day; a collection like that would be the envy of many a steam train enthusiast! Coming back down towards sea-level again, we happened upon a small-holding where the owner had a small flock of sheep, and, joy of joys, a half dozen emus in a paddock beside the road – more photos for the album!
Arriving at South West Rocks in the later afternoon, we checked out three or four inns before settling on the very historic Heritage Guest House, right on the waterfront. The next morning, we took our breakfast outside on the verandah overlooking the neighbouring cafe, making us feel like Lord and Lady Muck keeping an eye on the hoi polloi below. We walked out to the headland enjoying the sweep of the ocean rolling up the beach, dodging the drizzle as we walked the strand chatting to locals walking their dogs, and examined the few remains of the many wrecks of ships that mistook the bay for a safe haven.
As the drizzle turned into real rain, we drove a few kilometres to Arakoon National Park to visit Trial Bay Gaol, to learn about the harsh life of the convicts that were taken there to construct a long breakwater that would make the bay into a safe anchorage. Luckily for the beauty of the bay, the idea was a failure and little remains of the construction; however, the gaol itself is an interesting bit of Aussie history, made much more acceptable by the herd of kangaroos that now call it home, keeping the lawns trim, and, unlike the convicts, staying inside or outside the gates at night as they please.
Nelson Bay was our next two night stopover, where we woke up yet again to the sounds of birds chattering in the garden outside and breakfasted long and slow as we chatted with our hostess about local attractions and discussed the vagaries of welfare states and the problems with spoilt modern kids! This B & B was built on a steep slope with parking spaces atop a driveway that tested our SUV and challenged my driving skills as the acute angle meant I could hardly see over the bonnet.
Desperate to see our first koala, we went first of all to Tilligerry Habitat, a volunteer-run nature centre, where our guide, Sam, directed us to the tree where the one and only bear in town was resting, a female, he said, that was probably resting after an encounter with the dominant male that was no doubt somewhere close by. Multiple photos later, we finished our wander along the boardwalk, having searched unsuccessfully for the errant male but instead enjoyed the nature and the bay with the receding tide.
Lookouts with fine views were on order for the rest of the day and the first was Gan Gan Lookout on the way back into the town. We were able to drive up to the top and park next to the mobile phone antenna mast, a short walk around which gave us a good view of the estuary and the town below, but not much else. Tomaree Head Lookout on the other side of town was another matter altogether.
Parking the car at sea level, we commenced the 1.5 km hike to the top of the 161m high peak, and fairly soon we were greeted by snuffling sounds as an echidna shuffled into view. Looking somewhat like a cross between a porcupine and a hedgehog, this unusual creature is actually an anteater, and as we watched him (or her?) absolutely fascinated, it stuffed its beaked face deep into the piles of dead leaves and undergrowth beside the path and continued to snuffle up insects. The footpath was well constructed with a mix of rocky steps, steel staircases and platforms, taking us eventually to the remains of the WWll radar station right on the peak, the views from which were breathtaking. The headland guards the south side of the entrance to Nelson Bay and we had a full 360 degree panorama of the sea, the coast and the bay.
Looking south we had the most beautiful view of our trip to date, the golden sands of the trio of fairly inaccessible Zenith, Wreck and Box beaches, and further away, Fingal Spit and Shark Island with Point Stephen Lighthouse thereon. It was quite breathtaking and well worth the fairly tough climb to get to the top. The end of the afternoon was not so special as, tempted by the view across the harbour, we chose a lousy restaurant for an early dinner of the most awful seafood spaghetti, that totally shattered our hopes of light Italian pasta with fresh-off-the-boat shellfish.
Luckily we still had ahead of us the pleasure of watching a large group of kangaroos as they congregated on the local golf course at dusk for their evening meal of tasty well-kept grass. We kept on watching until it was nearly too dark to see anything any more, and we retired happily to our digs.
The next morning we started our final drive into Sydney where we were going to stay with my eldest niece Nicola and her family; it is certainly a great way to travel around a continent as large as Oz, having family to visit in so many great places! It was a fairly short drive compared to the previous hops and we opted to follow the Pacific Highway for much of the way, making sure we avoided the many toll roads that we had been warned about on the approach to the city. However, our hosts of the previous evening had said we mustn’t miss the “spectacular” dunes along 30+ kilometres of the Worimi Regional Park coastline, and we duly turned east at the signpost for Stockton Beach, where we were faced with a sign advising us that one had to have a permit to drive on the beach. Interpreting this as being the limit we could take our admittedly fairly competent Nissan X-Trail, we parked and set off on foot towards the distant piles of windswept sand. Then we saw a very ordinary saloon driving towards us, the driver of which suggested that we go back and get our SUV as there was quite a long walk, “. . . though just be careful of the big dogs that are protecting their owner’s truck in the little parking space at the end”.
Gladly we followed his advice, found the aforesaid vicious dogs to be really quite friendly, and tramped up the side of the hot sand dune till we could see the sea.
Fairly impressive but not really “spectacular”, we appreciated the excuse to exercise our lower limbs, and soon returned to the highway. We skirted around Newcastle which looked fairly industrial and eventually arrived at Nicola’s home in Middle Cove, an up-market waterfront suburb of Sydney.
We have now learnt that what we have been doing is “relly-surfing”, taking advantage of the hospitality of your family connections, something that the locals seem to be quite familiar with. For starters we had a busy long-weekend exploring bits of Sydney and some of it’s outlying suburbs. Nicola took us on a hike in Ku-ring-gai Chase NP showing us some of the beautiful local scenery that makes Sydney such a desirable place to live; and there at last I was finally tempted in for a swim.
Pittwater and Avalon, nearby both of which my sister lived for several years when her family were young, were both very enviable, lots of sheltered sailing waters, little coves with boats on their moorings, and all within easy reach of Sydney’s “CBD” or central business district. We took a ferry to Manly which gave us great views of Sydney Harbour on the way. We enjoyed a Saturday morning visit to the produce market in the old railway sheds in the Burlington district, and a walk around much-gentrified Paddington where very small two-storey row houses, the main visual virtue of which was their very ornate cast iron balcony railings, sold for upwards of two million Aussie dollars.
We strolled through the Botanical Gardens, wonderfully situated on the waterfront close by the famous Harbour Bridge, where we discovered the true character of kookaburrahs. As we drank our coffee on the cafe terrace, we watched one of these “sweet” birds suddenly dive down from a nearby signpost and grab a piece of cake out of the hand of a young lady as she was about to take a bite, and carry it off to share it with its mate waiting on the nearby lawn.
And of course, not wanting to miss out on Australian culture, we went to a performance of La Traviata in the Opera House. But best of all, it was a real joy getting such a warm welcome from Nicola and Robert, being fed so well and meeting all the family.
Our next relative that also made us feel very welcome was my nephew, Alistair, who along with his partner, Jo, and their two children, had moved to Margate in Tasmania about eighteen months previously. To get there we opted to follow the coast to Melbourne, making overnight stops at Bateman’s Bay, Pambala Beach and the strangely named Lakes Entrance. We used AirBnB for all three places and were more than satisfied with all of them, especially as they all provided rooms within the family home, the original concept of AirBnB before it became the glorified holiday-letting agency it is now. Booking wasn’t always plain sailing with poor internet connections, and a stop for lunch at Bodalla Cheese Factory one day provided us with very good wi-fi when we were having difficulties with clarifying a couple of reservations.
The countryside was mostly rolling hills and open farmland with lots of happy-looking cattle chewing the cud in green pastures. Lakes Entrance was probably the least attractive of the three towns but the flower-filled garden in which we ate our breakfast more than made up for the character the town lacked. And just a few miles further on we arrived at Paynesville where we took the chain-ferry across the narrows to Raymond Island, having learnt that there were a few koalas there. We followed the “Koala Trail” carefully scrutinising every gum tree until we found ourselves in a bit of scrubby parkland where suddenly it seemed that every other tree had one of the cuddly bears taking a late morning nap. What a koala bonanza to enjoy just before we arrived in Melbourne!
Before getting the overnight ferry to ‘Tassie’, we decided to use our Air Miles to give us a couple of comfortable nights downtown – or “CBD” in local parlance – staying at the Mercure Melbourne Treasury Gardens Hotel. Melbourne is a very elegant city being an eclectic mix of late Edwardian architecture and ultra-modern skyscrapers.
It is a beautiful city, and, indeed, it does have a lot of fine buildings. We spent our time there well, starting with a quick visit to the very enlightening Immigration Museum where amongst other things, we learnt about the ever-changing immigration policies, and interestingly, how the Chinese immigrants had yo-yo’d between being very welcome and despised for taking jobs from white Australians! The Opal Museum turned out to be not much more than a sales outlet for Australia’s favourite gemstone so we quickly moved on, taking advantage of the ‘free CBD tram zone’ to ride the No.35 around the perimeter of the downtown area and out to Harbour City, a complex of very modern apartments, hotels and offices by the waterside.
We had a light lunch of good old fish’n’chips, sitting on bolted down chairs as we watched the seagulls and the large power boats moored nearby, all of which reflected no doubt on the clientele frequenting the neighborhood.
It was damned hot, so we took the soft option of the tram back along Flinders St, and then spent a contented hour or so “city-beaching” on Federation Square, that is relaxing in deck chairs in the contemporary urban surroundings and watching city life go by. As the sun went down, we took a walk into China Town looking for a particularly nice-looking cafe we’d spotted the previous evening called “Ca de Vin” in a small alley off Bourke St, only to find it was incredibly popular and fully booked. So we ended up slumming it at “Ajisen Ramen” where we ate bowls of kimchi and pork ramen soup. There are lots of Asians in Melbourne so it was no surprise that the restaurants in China Town were so busy!
As the ferry didn’t leave until 10pm, we had a second day to enjoy the culture of Victoria’s state capital. Fitzroy Gardens, across the road from our hotel, is the final resting place of the Yorkshire cottage that Captain Cook spent his youth, and thus Cook’s Cottage was our first stop of the day. Amazing to think someone thought it worthwhile dismantling the cottage brick by brick and transporting it half way around the world, but the end result is very good and does look quite authentic, even down to the vegetable garden. But as always, art galleries were our objective for the day, starting with the Ian Potter Centre – part of the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV) – where we were happy to find some excellent aboriginal art, as well as an eclectic collection of art, both old and modern, from Europe and Australia.
The other main part of the NGV is inside the impressive stone edifice across the river on St Kilda Road. My goodness, what an extraordinary collection of modern art and art projects that building contains, some of which was totally outrageous; as we both agreed afterwards, it was probably the most original art collection either of us has ever seen.
But like all cities, Melbourne was too busy for me and I also tend to agree with the person who said something along the lines “Sydney has the most beautiful location that is spoiled by a poorly designed city, and Melbourne is a very fine city built on the most uncompromising site imaginable”! So it was a relief when we got back into our car, drove down to the beach at St Kilda, and watched the kite surfers playing the wind and waves in the early evening as we enjoyed our beef sandwiches and waited to spend a wave rocked night aboard the “Spirit of Tasmania”.
And so to Tasmania, aah . . . beautiful Tassie, an island so different from it’s mother country ten hours sea-time away to the north, that it would seem to be on a different planet. In the early morning sunshine, we drove south across the centre of the island through wonderful countryside, very green hills and farmland with sheep and cows grazing everywhere.
We made a couple of stops on the way, at Launceston, to take the chairlift and stretch our legs on the Gorge Walk, and then later on at the charming old heritage village of Ross, where we grabbed coffee and scrumptious cream-filled eclairs, and picked up one or two gifts at the old Post Office.
In so many ways the island immediately reminded me of New Zealand, a feeling echoed by a couple from those enchanted isles that we met one day as we visited Eagle Hawk Nest, the narrow isthmus that connects the infamous penal colony of Port Arthur to the main island.
The man’s opening remark as we regarded the statue of one of the “ugly and savage” dogs that once guarded the isthmus was “This must be one of the most awful things the Brits ever did”, referring of course to the transportation of so-called convicts, some of whom were guilty of such petty crimes as stealing a loaf of bread. But having established we both had the same UK heritage, the encounter became more friendly, and when I told him of my past, selling Hamilton Jets to Canadians, he most effusively declared me to be “an honorary Kiwi”.
The history of Tasmania closely follows the rest of Australia regarding attitudes to both convicts and the original inhabitants. However, Port Arthur was certainly among the most severe penal colonies and the settlers’ attitude towards the aborigines was also simply appalling. Surely the worst incident was the so-called “Black Line”, which attempted to drive every single native Tasmanian onto the Tasman Peninsular – where Port Arthur is situated – shooting any who attempted to escape and keeping the main part of the island as a completely white-only community!
Still, if one can blank out the horrendous past history of the island and concentrate on the here and now, it is a truly beautiful place and it was very tempting to immediately start searching for a house – our regular weakness when travelling! We were also very lucky in having such a comfortable place to stay, and in such a wonderful location. Margate is a small town about 20km outside Hobart, and Alistair’s home is in a quiet valley about 6km inland from the town centre. They have a spacious house sitting on about five acres of land which they are slowly making productive. Alistair is a commercial saturation diver but between contracts he and Jo work towards their long-term dream of one day achieving that age-old ideal of self-sufficiency, as their two children, Jessica and Archer, enjoy the freedom of an idyllic life in the countryside.
Our first foray the next morning was a wonderful hike down to Snug Falls and back, before exploring further along Channel Highway, winding along the coast as far as Nine Pins Point, at which stage we realised we had better retrace our steps to get home in time for dinner with the family. One week in such idyllic surroundings was really never going to be long enough.
As well as our ongoing discovery of Australia’s convict past, we took a trip into Hobart, a very liveable small city, and visited Tasmania’s other main tourist venue, the Museum of New and Old Art (MONA) housed underground in an old stone quarry. The main collection there is The Museum of Everything, an eclectic private collection of what is best described as “primitive art”, now donated to the state. Though definitely not the efforts of the Great Masters, the works on view are indeed quite eye-opening and thought-provoking; for instance, a mechanical working model of a cow’s digestive system, and a long wall full of plaster moulds of vaginas, are not things one comes across in the average art museum!
Another day we took the ferry from Kettering to Bruny Island, a 50plus kilometre long archipelago that shields Tasmania’s south-eastern coastline from Hobart southwards against the wild weather from Antarctica. The ferry lands on North Bruny and we immediately headed south along a mix of tarmac and gravel towards Cape Bruny Lighthouse, stopping on the way to climb the 250 steps up to Big Hummock Lookout halfway along the Neck, the narrow isthmus between the north and south portions of Bruny. There we also read a very moving memorial to Truganini, an aboriginal lady who was the last surviving member of the Nuenone tribe who had been raped multiple times by white settlers, and whose family had also suffered terribly at the hands of the white immigrants. Once on South Bruny, we paused briefly at Captain Cook’s landing place on the cove of Adventure Bay and ate fish and salad at the little cafe nearby, run by the local cruise company who operate boat tours along the coast.
Still hoping to get to the lighthouse before the end of the afternoon, we took a short cut along Coolangatta Road, a “4WD-only” trail across the centre of Mt Margan Forest Reserve, where we came upon the remains of an old steam-driven timber mill. Nature had done what it always will do eventually when man moves out of the way, and taken back control of the forest. All the same there was a simple footpath for us to follow, with a few faded information boards telling us about the tough life these early lumbermen led in the early 1900s, as well as one or two rusting artifacts such as an old scotch boiler and the steam-driven winch they used to haul the logs up out of the valley. Moving quickly on, we eventually arrived at the lighthouse just in time to take the last tour to the top where we had great views of the coastline all around and were regaled with tales of lighthouse keepers of the past.
Realising that the day was passing quickly, we opted to drive the 66km to Dennes Point at the far north end of North Bruny, and then make a quick U-turn to get back for the 6pm ferry. Alas, after a fun rally-style drive, we arrived at the terminal to see the ferry pulling away and we settled down for an hour-long wait for the last ferry of the day. For our entertainment, a local guy was wading in the water off the rocky beach, picking up large stones covered in oysters which he smashed and fed to himself and his little daughter. Another local, along with his son, was jigging for squid to use as bait on his next fishing trip. Having last eaten around midday, we were also rather glad of the tasty loaf we had bought earlier at Bruny Island Cheese and Beer Company, and munched on it to keep the wolf from the door till we could find an open eatery back on the “mainland”.
Our final full day on Tasmania was a Saturday and with everyone at home we went out for a family picnic at the Huon Valley and a stroll along the Tahune Air-Walk.
This well engineered construction takes you among the tree-tops of a handsome pine forest, which includes a few remaining examples of the huge Huon pines that were so valuable to the “tree-getters” (=lumbermen) of yesteryear and are enormous, almost as impressive as our Californian sequoia trees. The walkway ends up cantilered outwards, high above the Huon River, where a few logs still remain caught along the riverbanks, having failed to reach their destination at some lumber-mill far downstream.
On Sunday morning, we sadly had to say farewell to our lovely hosts and set off on our drive to Devonport to catch the overnight ferry back to Melbourne. It was a damp grey rain-sodden day, the island seemingly also saddened by our departure; however, it did give us one last delightful surprise. We opted to take a more westerly route on the way back across the island, and after a couple of hours of driving up into the hills through some fairly wild rugged countryside, we had stopped for lunch and a warm-up in front of the blazing log fire at The Great Lake Hotel, a couple of kilometres outside the small village of Miena. Suitably revived we drove on, and as we started to descend from that stark plateau country, we came across a sign directing us to “Liffey Falls, 6km”.
With plenty of time on our hands, this seemed like a good way to pass the rest of the afternoon and so we set off along the dirt road which wound down around the edge of a steep-sided drop to the valley in the forest far below, slightly to Celine’s occasional concern as she was on the outside of the extremely narrow track. From the car park at the end of this precipitous descent, we had the most beautiful walk further down the hillside through a wonderland of enormous ferns among the giant trees of a thick sub-tropical forest, with the sound of falling water getting louder with every step, until we finally got to the upper shallow cascade, and then a bit further on we arrived at the falls proper. Suddenly we were thankful for that day’s non-stop rain, as the swollen River Liffey was in full spate, making the falls extremely impressive.
Our surprise gift fully appreciated, we drove the final miles through farmland with contented black Angus beef cattle munching the fresh green grass everywhere, eventually joining the queue for our return voyage on “Spirit of Tasmania. Nine hours later, after a slightly choppy crossing which half way through the night caused the skipper to slow down from his usual 28knots, we arrived back on the Australian mainland a couple of hours after sunrise, and thus the second stage of our Aussie adventure was over. Now all we had to do was a leisurely drive 1800+ kilometres across country back to my big sister on the Sunshine Coast.
