Letter from A?Broad

Wednesday, 18 January 2012 14:45

Written by Editor

TANTALISING TASMANIA

After our exploits up the mountain then back into the city for a couple of days we got back on  a plane for our journey to Tasmania.
From Melbourne’s Tullamarine airport it was a short flight of just over an hour into Hobart. A lovely flat right on Hunter Street next to the port had been booked for us and, although Tasmania is known for being colder (from the south of the island where Hobart is, the next stop is Antarctica!) the weather wasn’t too bad, around 18ºC during the day down to around 12ºC overnight.

On the first day we arrived fairly late in the afternoon so went for a walk around the town to familiarise ourselves. The next day we were up bright and early and in the car off to have a wander along the Huon Highway which runs all the way from Kingston to the north down to Southport in the south where we would pick it up. Names are familiar from the days when people named where they were living in Australia after those they remembered from home in England.

We stopped at a small place called Kettering (there we go again with the names) where the people kept sailboats and the ferry to Bruny Island nature reserve ran from, for a cup of coffee then off we went. We carried on along the Channel Highway looking at lots of lovely homesteads and little bungalows along the way. The architecture in Victoria and Tazmania is very much in line with Victorian England. A lot of the houses have porches and verandahs that have corners and railings of incredibly intricate ironwork – it’s almost like having lace doilies in the corners.

We went past “Flowerpot”  and “Eggs and Bacon Bay” – I kid you not! – and eventually reached the Huon Highway. We  stopped for lunch in Cygnet where they have a home-made chocolates factory (and, no, I did not indulge but only because I don’t like their chocolate – even Lindt chocs  taste weird there – then carried along to the National Park at Geeveston. Now, I am anything but a lover of heights. If the pile on a carpet is too thick I get queasy! They had a thing called an “Airwalk” to enable you to see the forest better. I told the girl as we were buying tickets that I don’t like heights but in true Aussie style she said, “Aw, you’ll be right, it’s not that high.” I will never, ever believe anybody who says that to me again!

The walk turned out to be at tree-tops level some 48 metres above ground (see pic ) and is 597 metres long. It was made out of metal mesh so that, wherever you looked other than straight up, there was a huge drop. I was not happy and it was a miracle I held it together without shouting “We’re all gonna die!” until the end of the thing where we got off and I was promptly sick. If you don’t mind or love heights this is definitely the thing for you, if you don’t like them, don’t even think of going on it as there are pathways at ground level to walk along quite happily. Oh yes, and if you manage to stick it out on the Airwalk, there’s swinging rope bridges over the Huon fast flowing river further up the trail!