Day One: Hobart to Strahan via Tarraleah and Lake St Clair

Getting there
Strahan is some 300km from Hobart on Tasmania’s west coast. Located on the edge of the Macquarie Harbour it is the gateway to the Gordon River and the south west wilderness. If you’re flying into Hobart and hiring a car, compare the cost of picking up the car from Hertz at the airport (and paying the airport concession recovery fee) or taking a taxi to the Hertz downtown Hobart location (and paying a taxi). The airport recovery fee is 15% of [(the daily hire + admin recovery) x 10% GST]. The taxi fare is $30-35 and the trip takes around 15 minutes. If you end up taking the hire car from the airport, beware the speed camera on the Derwent River Bridge leading into the city.

While in Hobart, you can stock up on quality lunch and picnic provisions at the Hill Street Grocer in West Hobart.

Most of the journey to Strahan is along the Lyell Highway, which after a long stretch of farming land, enters forest where it cuts through some of the largest tracts of temperate rainforest in the world.

There are numerous opportunities for walks and there are scenic views at Tarraleah, a small village with boutique accommodation and a nice café that sits high above a valley and overlooks the Tarraleah hydro electricity plant. (You can’t miss the turn off to Tarraleah – just look for sight of five large pipes appearing from the forest, running under the road and then reappearing on the other side.)

More importantly, don’t miss the turn off to Lake St Clair, Australia’s deepest lake. While there, consider purchasing a Tasmanian National Parks Holiday Pass - $56 and valid for 8 weeks. This is an essential tool as you spend a lot of time passing through national parks, and the daily entry fee is $22 – which you’ll otherwise pay to enter the Lake St Clair precinct.

Tarraleah Power Station

Lake St Clair

You’ll also pass through the moonscape of Queenstown, however if you take the Wilderness Railway on one of your days in Strahan (see Day Two) you'll return here and have some historical background to put the place into its right perspective. Otherwise spend half an hour in Queenstown before continuing to Strahan. (A tourism brochure produced by the Cradle Coast Authority in 2007 likened Queenstown to a "freakshow" and described it as a "monstrosity". While the brochure was withdrawn, visit the place and you may understand what the authors were thinking...)

If at this point the foretaste of Queenstown and its surrounds has you wondering why you’re heading to Strahan, keep driving and rest assured that in 30 minutes - once you’re there - all will become clear.

Strahan Fishing Boats

Place to stay and eat.
In Strahan, we stayed at the Macquarie Terraces, located above the bakery and some other shops in the main street. The terraces and are a part of the Strahan Village, which is operated by Pure Tasmania.

For a nice end to the day, make your way to the Strahan Village main office, turn left in the street before the office and look for the signs (and the stairs) to the Executive Hilltop Aparments. Climb the stairs (lots of them!) till you get to the View 42° Bar, then it on the outdoor terrace and enjoy the view with a cold drink.

Dinner at the fish café on the wharf (also owned by Pure Tasmania) is good, as is the fish shop (independent) in the main street. We can vouch for both and the obvious choices are fresh local salmon and crayfish. For more upmarket options (which we didn’t try) there’s the dining room at the Franklin Manor or the waterfront restaurant at Risby Cove.

Both Franklin Manor and Risby Cove offer accommodation (the former is located hillside and quite olde worlde while the other is modern and on the waterfront, but not sure the quality of the Rivsby Coves rooms – from the online pics its hard to tell). Other accommodation options include Ormiston House (4 rooms, very olde worlde – looks great for winter, not sure about summer) and Motel Strahan, which was completed in December 2006 and looks quite good. But there are plenty more to choose from. Apart from Wotif’s Strahan listings it’s also worth looking at the apartments on Stayz – there are 16 listed.

Accommodation above the Shops

Recreated Stone Cottages

Day Two: (Strahan) Wilderness Railway to Queenstown

The West Coast Wilderness Railway is one of several tours and experiences offered by Pure Tasmania and is a faithful recreation of the original railway between Queenstown and Strahan that was built by hand in 1896. The track uses the unique Abt rack-and-pinion system invented by the Swiss engineer, Dr Roman Abt – the only railway system possible to get through the steep and rugged terrain. The trip involves lots of great scenery and is accompanied by laconic commentary that provides interesting insights into the pioneering days and the area’s history.

The West Coast Wilderness Railway

The train line is all that disturbs pristine forests

The trip ends at Queenstown, where after a short break to look around, a coach takes you back to Strahan. It’s an all day excursion and in addition to the two regular two carriages, the Wilderness Railway features a Premier Carriage, which has comfortable upholstered seats (bring cushions for the “authentic” wooden seats of the other carriage). Apart from this and other creature comforts, the Premier carriage offers a slightly better view and includes sparkling wine at breakfast, pastries for morning tea, lunch and then cheese in the afternoon, with a fine selection of Tassie wines constantly available. On the day we travelled, we only shared the Premier Carriage with Margaret and Brian, a delightful retired English couple who we’d later meet on the Gordon River Cruise and then bump into again on the other side of the island, in Freycinet.

The regular carriage price includes a more modest lunch, with beverages available for purchase.

Afternoon cheese (and more wine) in the Premier Carriage

Two things to do in the evening

If you have time, there are two special evening activities worth doing in Strahan. You can do them both on the one night if you like.

The first is “The Ship that Never Was”, Australia’s longest-running play, which provides a light-hearted re-enactment of historic events based on a daring escape from the penal settlement of Sarah Island. The two-person play is performed daily at 5.30pm by the Round Earth Theatre Company in a small theatre on the side of the West Coast Visitor Information and Booking Centre. The Ship That Never Was is lots of fun and involves a great deal of audience participation and improvisation. If you do the Gordon River cruise, you’ll visit Sarah Island (where actors from the same theatre company are employed as interpretive guides), so you’ll probably get more out of the play if you go after the cruise.

The second activity is visiting Ocean Beach. Not only is this a great place to catch a sunset, it’s also the place and the time to watch the landing of the short-tailed shearwaters (or mutton birds) as they return to their nests in the dunes after a day of feeding. This colony is one of the largest on the island with about 4,000 birds, and while shearwaters aren't that elegant and athletic on the land as they stumble into their burrows, they can fly up to 80 kilometres an hour. They have also been known to fly up to 15,000 kilometres during their migratory period. A Ranger from the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife is usually in attendance at dusk during the tourist season, to provide an interesting talk about the birds and their habitat.

]
Sunset at Ocean Beach