• Bronze
  • Bronze

NW Tasmania 2023

Another trip to Tasmania….👍🏻😜 Read more
  • Trip start
    March 10, 2023

    Burnie

    March 12, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 15 °C

    We travelled to Burnie on the way to visiting the ‘Nut’ (more on that later) and had some breakfast at a cafe just on the beach.
    Burnie is a port city on the north-west coast of Tasmania, Australia. When founded in 1827, it was named Emu Bay, being renamed after William Burnie, a director of the Van Diemen's Land Company, in the early 1840s.

    I also remember a Midnight Oil song called Burnie and suspect it relates to the following…
    The key industries are heavy manufacturing, forestry and farming. The Burnie port along with the forestry industry provides the main source of revenue for the city. Burnie was the main port for the west coast mines after the opening of the Emu Bay Railway in 1897. Most industry in Burnie was based around the railway and the port that served it.

    After the handover of the Surrey Hills and Hampshire Hills lots, the agriculture industry was largely replaced by forestry. The influence of forestry had a major role on Burnie's development in the 1900s with the founding of the pulp and paper mill by Associated Pulp and Paper Mills in 1938 and the woodchip terminal in the later part of the century.

    It also has a thriving population of little penguins along this section of the coastline with many burrows along the foreshore as well as an interesting breakwater which sits off the jetty area designed to protect the ships when loading cargo.
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  • The ‘Nut’

    March 12, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    We travelled to the town of Stanley which has two big tourist attractions…The Nut and Hursey Fish restaurant which is renown for having an extra large rock lobster 🦞 on the roof.

    The Nut is a volcanic plug near the town of Stanley, Tasmania. It is made of fragments of basaltic volcanic rock from a volcano that was active about 25–70 million years ago. It has an elevation of 143 metres (469 ft) above sea level. The areas around it are culturally significant to the local Tarkine Aboriginal people because of stone formations, middens, quarries and artefact scatters near the area.

    The European discovery of the Nut was made by George Bass and Matthew Flinders when they circumnavigated Tasmania in the sloop Norfolk. The origins of its name are speculated to be from the Tasmanian Aboriginal name, "munatrik" (moo-nut-re-ker).

    It is a steep short walk to the top and it is also possible to take a chair lift as well. It is a nesting place for mutton birds who dig burrows to hatch their chicks. The mountain has an exposed and a protected side which allows a different bio diversity of vegetation with some taller trees.
    As you can see there are some magnificent views of the surrounding town of Stanley which sits at the base of the ‘Nut’.

    We ordered a seafood basket for 2 and was unable to finish it and so the seagulls had an extra helping.
    The fish was so fresh and it was some of the best fish and a chips I have eaten.
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  • Stanley

    March 12, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ⛅ 17 °C

    Stanley is a quaint small coastal town quite famous for being the birthplace of Australia’s 10th PM Joe Lyons.
    The town was also famous for being the seaside location for a movie “A Light Between…” which is a tale of two adults find an infant at sea in a dinghy and decide to adopt it as their own. This later goes pear shaped when the mother of the child starts to investigate…
    It is not hard to see why this town would be suitable as it has a large number of heritage listed houses built in and around the 1840’s.
    The town is quaint and set in a very picturesque part of the coast line.
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  • Nude Photo Shoot

    March 12, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    This beautiful place was the surprise photo shoot location for Bronze in the shallows of Bass Strait.
    In keeping with our 3 month ritual of cold water therapy I am taking any opportunity to lay down in cold water and this place looked as good as any.
    So clothes off and into Bass Strait. There happened to be a few holiday houses around and one fronting the beach but he seemed pretty cool.
    Pretty lonely place to live although beautiful nevertheless.
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  • Port Sorrell

    March 13, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    What’s up here…in short not much. We rode from Shearwater to Port Sorrell and found nothing but a jetty and some bike trails…

  • Archie’s Nob

    March 13, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    We visited another National park just outside of Port Sorrell.
    It was another beautiful day and so we divided to walk to a local landmark called Archie’s Nob.
    We were fortunate enough to come across three snakes on this walk…2 Tiger snakes and 1 White lipped snake which is small and also venomous.
    We also noticed a significant amount of die back with the grass trees around the top of the island. There is some form of fungus that is very powerful and overtime it seems inevitably kills the host plant …very sad.
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  • Sheffield

    March 14, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 14 °C

    Many towns in Tasmania have developed some quirky concepts to draw tourists.
    Sheffield is no exception and has developed a reputation for murals so most parts of the town are festooned with historical and contemporary murals.
    And as you may guessed people come to visit for that reason alone.
    There are also some quirky shops in Sheffield that make it interesting.

    Sheffield is a town 23 kilometres inland from Devonport on the north-west coast of Tasmania. Sheffield has long been the rural hub for the Mount Roland area. The Sheffield area is well known for its high quality butterfat production via dairy farming. The area is suitable for lamb and beef production. The town of Railton is nearby. At the 2021 census, Sheffield had a population of 1,602.
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  • Cradle Mountain

    March 14, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 14 °C

    Time to revisit Cradle Mountain and much has changed since our last visit.
    New facilities and a much more versatile menu of walks even with a shuttle bus service.
    Cradle Mountain is a locality and mountain in the Central Highlands region of the Australian state of Tasmania. The mountain is situated in the Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park.

    At 1,545 metres (5,069 ft) above sea level, it is the sixth-highest mountain in Tasmania.

    The locality of Cradle Mountain is a rural locality in the local government areas of Meander Valley, Kentish and West Coast in the Launceston and North-west and west local government regions of Tasmania.

    The park contains many walking trails, and is where hikes along the well-known Overland Track usually begin.
    Major features are Cradle Mountain and Barn Bluff in the northern end, Mount Pelion East, Mount Pelion West, Mount Oakleigh and Mount Ossa in the middle and Lake St Clair in the southern end of the park. The park is part of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area.

    Animals present in the park include: Tasmanian pademelons, Bennett's wallabies, quolls, Tasmanian devils, short-beaked echidnas, platypuses, common wombats, possums, forest ravens and currawongs.
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  • Cradle Mountain (cont’d)

    March 14, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 17 °C

    This was the beautiful vista at the end of our walk from Marion’s lookout which enabled us to get some amazing uninterrupted views of the mountain and the beautiful Dove lake in the foreground.
    I decided to continue my ice bath tradition and sat in Dove lake sans clothes for about 10 minutes.
    Very funny as some Chinese tourists came over for a better look 😛.
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  • Cradle Mountain Chalet

    March 14, 2023, Bass Strait ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    We decided to have a snack and a local cocktail here and before imbibing we walked around the “enchanted walk” one of Tasmania’s most renown short walks. Beautiful lichen gullies with a clear mountain stream cascading through the middle.
    Very picturesque…
    We shared a bowl of chips and a couple of Bush Martini’s which were unfortunately nothing special and tasted a little like limoncello 😳.
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  • Narawntapu National Park

    March 15, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☁️ 20 °C

    We undertook some amazing walks in this park. Short and full of interesting wildlife…3 snakes in 20 minutes :) and one small snake which I didn’t realize was venomous but is…
    Jen and I had a naked dip…which was a break through for Jen.Read more

  • Melrose Creek Botanical Gardens

    March 16, 2023 in Australia ⋅ 🌬 20 °C

    A collective botanical garden that features different trees and shrubs from different parts of the world.
    Also got to see a couple of platypi up close sifting little critters from the mud from the bottom of the creek.
    Very playful little fellas and amazingly out during the day.
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  • Hellyers Whiskery

    March 18, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 17 °C

    Jen organised a visit to a local renown whisky distillery which was a treat as we were schooled in the finer aspects of the whisky making process.
    We even bottled our own special single malt blend with a wax seal and taken from a special oak cask.
    We also had lunch in the restaurant which was also quite special.
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  • The Cove

    March 18, 2023 in Australia ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    The was a special place to conclude our holiday. It was a piece of farm land that has been converted to a luxury escape.
    The accommodation sits atop of a beautiful bay that is for the sole use of the residents and Jen and I took up the offer doing some of our cold water therapy in a couple of the rock pools.
    The highlight of the stay was watching the penguins 🐧 come in from the ocean after feeding and return to their burrows.
    I even got a chance to touch and stroke one which was extra special as he turned away from the group and got isolated so he sort of froze and I helped him on his way.
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    Trip end
    March 20, 2023