Bart Bear's Blog

 

 

Our Macquarie Harbour cruise included a visit to Sarah Island. This was the site of one of the worst penal settlements in Australia. It only operated from 1822 to 1833 and was intended to hold the worst convicts and those that had escaped from other convict settlements. Although any convict escapee would have to first cross the cold water of the harbour and then battle through the dense rain forest and its snakes and insects (see my post below), around 20 of them did escape. Most were recaptured or died in the attempt. The most notorious one was Alexander Pearce. In September 1822 he escaped with 7 others, and survived by killing and eating the others before he was caught again. He escaped again the next year, this time with a young convict; again Pearce survived by killing and eating him. On 19 July 1824 he was hanged in Hobart for his crimes. Another group of convicts escaped in a ship they were building in the government shipyard and sailed across the Pacific to Chile. When the penal station closed, the convicts were transferred to Port Arthur (see earlier posts). Today the island is part of the heritage area. The only remains of the penal colony are ruins, some in roped-off enclosures with explanatory signs and many just slowly eroding away in the jungle.

 

Apologies for the break in postings, the Oldies have both been sick and I have had to be Nurse Bart for the past week or so. Anyhow, back to our Tasmania photos. One of the places that is a "must see" is the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park. This is one of the wildest places left in the world and is World Heritage listed. The original explorers of the area came upriver from Macquarie Harbour and into the rainforest looking for timber suitable for shipbuilding. They found it in the majestic Huon Pine. Some of these trees are over 3,000 years old and over 20 metres tall. The early logging, bushfires and later flooding of the rivers for hydro-electric dams severely reduced the number of big trees, but since the area was made heritage in the 1980s new trees are coming back. Our cruise from Strahan took us up the Gordon river to Heritage Landing where a boardwalk lets visitors see into the dense forest. Keen walkers can also start their treks into the national park here. Many of our cruise passengers got off the boat, went a short way into the woods and returned very quickly; the flies here are huge and love the taste of human flesh. If you intend to walk through the area, take plenty of insect repellent and cover as much of you as possible. Fortunately, small bears aren't bothered by big flies so Dad and I took lots of photos of the boggy ground, the ferns and mosses and the occasional Huon Pine sticking up through the low scrub. This forest includes some of the most ancient plants on Earth, surviving from the time of Gondwana. It is definitely worth a visit (provided you prepare for the bitey flies).