“Let’s take off in the blue station wagon
and find the open road to salvation
away from here.”
- My Friend The Chocolate Cake, I’ve Got A Plan (1994)
“How long this cold dark night is taking.”
- Triffids, Bury Me Deep In Love (1987)
Last week my good mate from Tamworth, former midweek dinner buddy, and procurer of excellent price/taste ratio white wine, Miss MoneyPenny, flew in for her first ever visit to Tasnarnia. (That's us there on the top of Mt Wellington at Hobart). Determined to show her the best of the small state, we pored over tourist info in anticipation, and planned a full circumnavigation – what locals sometimes refer to as a “lap of Tassie” (insert vile, base joke of your choice here).
After a couple of settling-in days sampling the best local cuisine options (beer, wine, cheese, wine, fish 'n' chips, beer, more wine), we hit the road.
Distances are deceptive in Tasnarnia. What looks like 300km or 3 hours on a map may take upwards of 6 hours to travel, due to the wiggly roads, slow tourist traffic and variable weather conditions – a shock if you’re used to those long, straight stretches of road common in western NSW. However, being accustomed to lots of driving to get anywhere worthwhile, mainlanders often have a more determined approach to driving. On one day we managed to clock 500km on the odo AND take a 2-hour walk around Dove Lake at Cradle Mountain.
This is the way we went, and what we saw, in 6 days: Queenstown (west: mining moon landscape, huuuge steak sanga for lunch);
Cradle Mountain (walked around Dove Lake);
Devonport (overnight, watched Spirit II depart for Melbourne);
Smithton, on to Dismal Swamp (north-west: hair-raising 15-second slide down to the swamp sinkhole, at speeds of up to 60km/h);
Stanley, and The Nut (a local geological feature, not whatever you were thinking);
Burnie (cheese factory, another cheese factory);
Launceston (north: overnight, fancy dinner, Cataract Gorge and wineries the next day)
St Helens (east coast: fishing village, quaint locals);
Bicheno, then Coles Bay (overnight: Wine Glass Bay, the Hazards, oysters and mussels)
Port Arthur (south east: the old convict ruins);
And finally back to Hobart.
A few snapshots. We aimed be frugal at all times, with varying degrees of success. When we visited the cheese factories, the temptation of wheels of camembert and brie for $1 each was too much, and out came the cash and the esky. First Aid champion Miss MP helped treat an older visitor with diabetes who was hypoglycaemic and on the verge of passing out (maybe it was those cheese prices).
By the time we got to Launceston and had forked out for a tres fancy dinner and a number of cellar door vintages, we felt it would be prudent to economise by subsisting on cheese and wine for the following few days. By Thursday our bowels were not thanking us.
According to Miss MP the oysters at Coles Bay were outstanding; a dozen plate from a local oyster farm comprised six Pacific Oysters (the Japanese variety, most commonly seen in restaurants) and six of the native Tasmanian oyster, a larger, flatter beast which had its own distinct flavour. I do not care for the snot-globs, but happily tore into a bowlful of freshly steamed mussels - these were so fresh it only took a dash of balsamic vinegar to garnish, and down they went. Sadly, though delicious, they only compounded the wine-cheese subsistence items solidifying like concrete in our guts. The tasty Hazards beer, which I consumed at our aptly named accommodation Hazards House (with view of the Hazards), did not help.
The weather was perfect for the whole week: mild, clear skies and sunshine, warm but not hot. This is a veritable miracle for the state where weather is less predictable than Glenn Milne at the Walkleys; the week prior to Miss MP’s visit it had sleeted.
You learn things about another person when you are in a small enclosed space for many consecutive days. I learned that Miss MP is a packrat with tourist pamphlets. Every stop, there was another one that had useful info about attractions, accommodation or both, so into the car it went. Good thing the Volvo’s interior is cavernous; I nearly got a hernia taking out the recycling the following Tuesday. God knows what Miss MP learned about me that she could have done without knowing.
There were also wildlife adventures, and language difficulties. Miss MP had heard about bumble bees, and got quite excited when we saw some in the marvellous spring gardens at Port Arthur. I had forgotten how special they are. I also had to explain that the squat wallabies you see everywhere (usually begging for food at car parks) are not known as wallabies, but pademelons. You say that, paddy-melon. This is of course downright idiotic for any mainlander who has lived and travelled in the country and knows that paddy-melons are actually the large, globular fruits of a vine that tends to grow wild on the edge of paddocks. It took me about 8 months to figure out what Tasnarnians were talking about; for a long time, whole conversations completely missed the mark.
“Yeah, a big pademelon can write off your car if you hit it too fast.”
“Huh?”
And in case you ever find yourself in a Parks & Wildlife situation in Tasnarnia, the shaggy fronded foliage we mainlanders know as ‘tree ferns’, are referred to here as ‘man ferns’.
Don’t say you weren’t warned.
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