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Published: February 19th 2011
We had experienced the tail end of Anthony, a level 2 cyclone and we weren’t hanging around to witness the effects of level 5 Yasi which was heading right at us. We put our car in covered parking at the airport and without delay flew to Tasmania.
We already knew we would love Tasy and that a mere 6 days wouldn’t be enough; we woke up in Hobart a city with a European feel, cool, sunny and laid back. We did a short self-guided tour around the centre, sandstone buildings a mix of Georgian, Victorian and Deco, we felt right at home. The famous Salamander market is a bustling kafuffle colourful and swinging. Stalls selling German sausage, the local speciality Scallop pie, jewellery fashioned from local pearls and wood craft with a pungent smell of teak and eucalyptus.
We dashed off late morning to Port Arthur penitentiary; a place of contradiction – beauty and melancholy- as you stroll around the perfectly manicured English garden style grounds and impressive aristocratic style buildings listening to the evocative account of the history, you can almost see the convicts working in chains.
We were here on the Tasmin peninsular for a
reason other than to see the site. The entry to the area of land being the stunning Eaglehawk neck, a narrow piece of land fiercely guarded by the dog line back in the days of Port Arthur being operational. It is also the location I have been dreaming of diving for 2 years and I was chuffed because I didn’t think we would make it here. We stayed in a quirky hostel which consisted of a 4 bunk bedded shack set in ramshackle grounds shared with a large sheep and some ducks and in a jar on the office desk, a pickled snake. I rose at 6 to head down to the dive centre full of apprehension; would I or wouldn’t I see a Weedy sea dragon today and complete one of my resent life ambitions. This is a creature of majestic beauty which is threatened as its habitat, the Kelp forests of the Tasman and Southern oceans, rapidly diminish due to climate change. The skipper, a buoyant no messing around kind of a guy was bemused that I had travelled across the world and given myself only 2 possible dives (budget allowing) to see 1 species, he thought my
chances were about 10%. Diving in a kelp forest is a special experience and can be likened to how I imagine flying through a tropical rain forest (but allot colder frrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr) would be. The kelp rises up 20 meters in large columns and we drifted and wove through curly ropy twists and tails. The second dive was beautiful, we swum over masses of colourful kelp swaying in the drift and sponges and rocks but there were no dragons to be seen anywhere . As we surfaced with 100bar left (we were saving some air for a quick third dive with the seals) my face was forlorn. The skipper took one look at me and sent us back down to where directly under the boat is a rocky patch of kelp, a good spot for dragon hunting. Sure enough poking its long snout out from behind a rock was a weedy, even more beautiful and ethereal in real life, hovering and floating in its fragility. Within a few centimetres of it I could see its amazing colours red, green, orange, brown, weedy like kelp and its back fin, a row of uniformly flickering yellow feathers.
Tasmania is a place
of stunning beauty with fast changing scenery. The colours are autumnal, greens, burnt oranges and honey. Here there are undulating hills smothered with ripe vine, orchards of stone fruits; plums, nectarines, cherries as well as apples and walnuts. Everywhere are concave bays at the base of mountains and dark blue clear cold waters and white sand. We hiked 12 Km up the mountain in Freycenet national park and round to the famous wineglass bay. We journeyed to the southernmost part of the country {i}cockle bay{i} assessable by foot, a place discovered by Cook (with the French not far behind). This is known as The end of the road and is as close to Antarctica is it was our little van parked up in Queensland. Although magnificent in its sparkling natural beauty there is a dark history here and you can imagine the seas churning and heaving with tall ships and wale blood.
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P O'Dude
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Sigh..........
sigh................................................brilliant............................................keep on blogging!