Tasmania Part Three: The Tasman Peninsula & Port Arthur

We may be suckers for punishment, because after our 17.5km day tackling the Wineglass Bay walk, we headed down to the Tasman Peninsula to tackle another one!

The Tasman Peninsula is in the southeastern part of Tasmania, only about 75km southeast of Hobart, but for an area that’s so close to Tasmania’s largest city (population approximately 208,000), it’s chock-full of relatively untouched wilderness – our fave!

Here’s a few maps to orient you to the ground we cover in this post –

The Tasman Peninsula is connected to the Tasmania mainland by a 30 metre wide isthmus called Eaglehawk Neck, which presents a beautiful photo op, and a bit of history: when Port Arthur was a penal settlement back in the 1830’s to 1870’s, the isthmus was patrolled by a 18 chained vicious dogs (in addition to human sentries) and referred to as “The Dog Line“.

We like exploring (duh), so while our ultimate destination was the Cape Raoul Track, we did take a day to drive around the western part of the Tasman Peninsula and just have a look to see what’s out there – and I’m happy to report that there isn’t much (perfect), except a couple of campgrounds, your pick of isolated beaches and fishing spots, and a few farms.

With a day of rest under our belts, there was no putting it off any longer – we were off to give our poor legs another workout (even now, writing this two months later, my quads are quivering in sympathy to their past selves) and tackle the Cape Raoul Track!

The first part of the track, up until the lookout (so about 35 or 40 minutes of walking), is a forest track heading mostly uphill, and will leave you wondering when on earth you’ll be seeing some coastline on this supposedly coastal track??

But once you arrive at the lookout, you’re rewarded with some pretty incredible views.

That may be enough for some people, but not your two wandering Canadians…! We continued along the track to get an even closer look at Cape Raoul, requiring about another 6km of walking, this time with some gorgeous coast along the way.

Cape Raoul itself is made up of dolerite and upon closer inspection appears to be a cliff made of stone columns…I thought it looked so cool, like an alien landscape straight out of Game of Thrones (Old Valyria maybe??).

Now, with any out-and-back hike, the worst part is reaching the end (yay!), and then having to turn around and do the whole thing over again, in reverse (boo). Much prefer loop walks for this reason. Especially because the Cape Raoul walk had a TON of stairs…which was fine to walk down, but pretty painful to walk up again.

We stayed at a lovely campground (“Boneheads Campground”) located right at the start of the Cape Raoul track and privately run by quite the Tassie character, who was fond of gently mocking the campers who were maybe a little bit slow to catch on the camp rules or directions to the site… He also built a really beautiful sauna and bucket shower for campers to use and you’d better believe we REALLY enjoyed both the sauna and warm bucket shower after our long walk. Some photos below – basically, the process is to take wood from the pile supplied and feed it into the wood stove in the sauna, which heats both the room and the big metal barrel of water. You can then scoop up some hot water in a plastic bucket, and take it into the shower booth and have a bucket shower (using a cup to pour water over yourself – very European apparently).

Next up on our Tasman agenda was a visit to Port Arthur, infamous for a couple of reasons. It was one of Australia’s first penal colonies and conditions were pretty horrible for the prisoners there, and it’s since been developed into a massive historical complex/museum where you could spend days and days reviewing all of the artifacts and history. It was also the site of Australia’s largest and last mass shooting in 1996 where 35 people were killed. There is a memorial to those lost on the Port Arthur historic site grounds.

Port Arthur was well worth the admission and time, and we wish we had been able to spend longer. Two full days could easily be spent doing tours, wandering around the grounds and reading the stories posted of past inmates and guards, having a bite at the excellent restaurant, and strolling through the museum. The staff is also extremely passionate about their work and were a joy to interact with.

Finally, to close out our tour of the Tasman Peninsula, we headed off to a local recommended spot – Port Arthur Lavender Farm – for a walk around the grounds and yet another incredible Tassie platter.

Next up – the weird and wonderful Hobart, including the weirder and wonderful MONA!