About an hour’s flight south of Melbourne is the island of Tasmania –
an area of wilderness and beauty but with a past steeped in tragedy and
hardship. The first European to set foot
on Tasmania was Abel Janszoon Tasman, sailing for the Dutch East India Company,
who came ashore in December 1642. While
the island now bears his name, he originally named it Van Diemen’s Land in
honor of the governor-general of the Dutch Indies. He had no contact with the Aborigines that
inhabited the island, although he could see evidence of their existence – the
sound of singing, smoke from fires, a gong in the distance – and the eerie
feeling of “watching eyes on our proceedings.”
It is believed that the Aborigines inhabited this island for 30,000
years before the European colonization, but it was not until 1803 that the
British arrived in Tasmania. Noting the
isolation and climatic severity, and to keep the French from claiming this
island, the British government established a penal colony here. Over 75,000 convicts were eventually sent to
Tasmania. Perhaps the best description
of this place then came from an Irish political prisoner who wrote to his wife
“To find a jail in one of the loveliest spots formed by the hand of Nature in
one of her loneliest solitudes creates a revulsion of feeling which I cannot
describe.” And unfortunately, the brutal
system employed by the British Commonwealth in running this colony spilled over
to the indigenous population of Tasmania as well. The last full-blooded Tasmanian Aborigine
died in 1876.
Although the remnants of this penal colony exist today in Port Arthur,
Tasmania has become a mecca for tourists – brought here by the desire to
experience its wild beauty and tranquility.
Over one third of the island has been designated as national
parkland. The people are welcoming and
hospitable and also cook some of the best food in Australia, especially the
seafood around the Hobart area.
But that is not to say they do not have their problems. The Tasmanian devil, a local celebrity, is in
extreme danger of extinction due to a contagious facial-tumor disease. Efforts to contain this disease by isolating
healthy animals is an ongoing project.
There is also concern that a proposed pulp mill will dump large amounts
of pollutant material into the Bass Strait that separates Tasmania from
Australia.
The capital of Tasmania is Hobart,
a city with one of the deepest harbors in the world that straddles the Derwent
River on the South coast of Tasmania. The
open ocean lies about 31 miles downriver.
Settled in 1804, it is, after Sydney, Australia’s second-oldest
city. Long regarded as a gateway to the
south, Hobart lies closer to the Antarctic coast (1700 miles away) than it is
to Perth in Western Australia. Originally founded as a penal colony, it also
became a sailing/whaling town and today Battery Point, with its narrow lanes,
contains many of the homes of the old sailors, fishermen, whalers, coopers,
merchants, and master mariners. Battery
Point got its name from the guns that were placed on the promontory point in
1818 to defend the town against potential invaders.
We arrived in Hobart about 9:30 on 8 Mar after an uneventful flight
from Melbourne. The plane was only about
half full and I had the whole row to myself.
After days of blistering heat, it was cool and refreshing in Hobart, if
not a little windy. After taking the
Skybus into the city, we got off on the closest stop to our hotel, the Best
Western Hobart. We were told it was only
a 2 block walk, but what they didn’t tell us was that it was uphill. It was kind of a struggle with the luggage,
but we made it, and surprisingly, they had a room ready for us.
After unpacking, we set out on a walking tour around Battery Point and
the waterfront. The maps I had made it
look like an easy walk to these places, but it took us about 30 minutes to
reach the harbor area. Hobart is a very
hilly city. I think we are going to need
to learn how their bus system works.
Battery Point, one of the most well-preserved historical parts of
Hobart, was settled in the early 1800s and has retained the winding streets and
colonial architecture. It was home to
sailors, fishermen, whalers, merchants, and master mariners. In 1818 a battery of guns was built on the
promontory overlooking the Derwent River to defend the city against potential
invaders (especially the French). We
walked around Arthur Circus which is a circle of old, single frontage cottages dating
from the earliest days of Old Hobart Town.
Although these homes have been modernized inside, they still retain
their quaint charm on the outside. We
then walked through Princes Park, the former location of the Prince of Wales
Battery. Today it is a beautiful little
green park that overlooks the Derwent River and the finish line for the Sydney
to Hobart annual yacht race.
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| Cottage along Arthur Circus |
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| Lizard in Princes Park -- at least it wasn't a snake! |
From there we walked down Salamanca Place with its tall sandstone warehouses,
built during the whaling days in Hobart, that today house some of the trendiest
restaurants, shops, and art galleries.
Every Saturday they hold a large outdoor market. Through a small alley way between the
sandstone warehouses are Kelly’s Steps, a narrow set of steps named after the
1800's sea captain James Kelly. These
steps take up back up to Battery Point.
At the time they were constructed in 1839, Battery Point was on a cliff
overlooking the wharves and the steps were cut into the cliff and the sandstone
quarried from these cliffs was used to build the sandstone warehouses on
Salamanca Place.
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| Kelly's Steps |
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| Sandstone warehouses on Salamanca Place |
From Salamanca Place, we crossed over another park, Parliament House
Gardens, to view the Tasmanian Parliament building. Originally built as a
Customs House, it became the Parliament in 1841 when Tasmania became
self-governing. From there we crossed over to the waterfront and went to Fish
Frenzy for lunch. This was recommended
by our Skybus driver and it was also recommended in one of the walking tours I
found on line. We ordered the Fish
Frenzy which consisted of 2 pieces of crumbed fish (really a breaded,
deep-fried fish), 3 deep-fried scallops, three fried pieces of calamari, and
chips (our French Fries). Bill had a bottle
of Pale Ale from the local Cascade Brewery (which we will visit in a day or so)
and I had a class of wine. The lunch was
very good and was well worth the recommendations that it got.
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| Monument to Abel Tasman-the stars on the' white pillar form the Southern Cross |
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| Tasmania Parliament Building |
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| Hobart's Waterfront |
From lunch we walked to the Tasmanian Maritime Museum. They had a short film on whaling with
excerpts from Moby Dick as you watched the sailors in a small boat struggle
with a whale until it finally dies.
There was also a section on all the shipwrecks in the waters around
Tasmania. The roaring forties (the
latitude where the winds blow unimpeded from South America to New Zealand)
contain some of the most dangerous waters – not only are they prone to violent
storms and heavy waves, but danger lurks under the water with hidden rocks and
reefs. Since the first recorded wreck in
1797, over 1000 ships have been lost in these waters around Tasmania.
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| Bark Canoe used by aborigines to cruise the rivers of Tasmania |
From the museum, we caught a taxi back to the hotel. The clouds are building this afternoon so I
wonder if we will see rain at any time.
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