Port Arthur

7th December

Ilse & I really wanted to visit Port Arthur on the Tasman Peninsula. We had discussed it on the tour and Joe said it was really worth a visit. 

It's a very well preserved 19th century convict settlement, where there are remains of the prison buildings etc. It was named after George Arthur, Lieutenant Governor of Van Diemen's Land from 1824 to 1836 and he established the penal settlement in 1830. 

You need a car to get there so Ilse, Ramon & I hired a car (which we had to collect from the airport) & met up at their hostel in the morning. 

Then Joe messaged us - asking if we wanted to take a trip out there with him so we cancelled the hire car and Joe picked us up in his truck

We had a really lovely day cruising round the coast, our first stop was the Tasmanian devil Unzoo - basically more of a wildlife sanctuary than a zoo - but it was truly magical as we got to see Tasmanian devils, fed & petted kangaroos and green Rosella birds, and saw more pademelons.

This devil was waiting 'on cue' as we entered - Ilse asked, 'how far can they jump?' 😂 - they have the bite force of three pit bulls. Their mating ceremony is quite rough and they only have 4 teats in their pouch (the only carnivorous marsupial) and up to 40 babies, the size of a grain of rice. The four strongest crawl to the pouch and latch on and the mother eats the rest.

The first one was a male and these two are sisters. Their eyesight is poor but their sense of smell is really good

The guy rang a bell & the birds knew to fly down & eat the bird food in our hands....it was like something out of a Disney movie. They munched all the sunflower seeds first, often leaving the rest.....just like ours at home! 

At Port Arthur we had a Habour cruise and looked round the buildings. There were sad stories there of the convict's treatment and punishment. As one guide there said - these were people they didn't know what to do with. A lot of them had only committed petty crimes, often due to poverty, and the prisons were filling up so the convict settlements were a kind of 'social experiment' to see if they could build a new society. I guess Australia is the result. 

Isle of the dead, where they buried people:

The Commandant's house:

Young prisoners - sad stories

We got to look round the prison cells and read more prisoner's stories of escape and suicide & generally being broken by continuous punishment. Later on they started to try to build in reforming prisoners but it didn't really take on, or work and .......I'm not sure it does to this day

Joe brewed up a cuppa in the car park and me & Ramon did a 'Tim Tam slam' - another classic Australian custom - you bite off the corners of the Tim Tam, suck the tea through the biscuit and the centre goes all soft & gooey - Noice!

After this we went for a beautiful walk to Crescent Bay Beach

The three of them braved the antarctic water

Ilse and Ramon had to be at the airport later to fly back to Melbourne. On the way we stopped at a pub for a 'Pub feed' (Parmi burger, tomato sauce, bangers and mash), a pint and a game of pool - English verses Dutch - of course the English won 😀.

There was an incredibly drunk lady in there, in her slippers, trying to talk to us. She assumed I was their Mum - it was funny but it did look like that to be fair.

It was sad to say goodbye - I really enjoyed my time with such lovely friends. So energising to spend time in nature and also in the company of young people as nice as these three!