Wineglass Bay & Bicheno
The beds in Sandpiper cottages are sooo comfy! We were pretty impressed with this accommodation overall and would stay here again. It's a few kilometres out of town to the north of Bicheno and there is easy access to the beach. The cottages are set in well-maintained grounds that have several quirky wood carvings of various well-known Tasmanian identities. Each cottage has its own private BBQ and outdoor setting and hammock strung in the trees...it's perfectly for a peaceful getaway, but also very close to the Freycinet Peninsula where we're headed to explore.
We arrived quite early in the morning to Coles Bay on the Freycinet Peninsula. In time for a spot of morning tea and Barb bought the Sunday paper so she'd have something to read if she couldn't do the whole hike.
We parked up at the start of the National Park walk and loaded up drinks in our backpacks. Off we went. We were glad to be starting early, as it wasn't too crowded yet and was a bit cooler. The terrible wind from last night had died down too and it was a glorious day. Our first viewing point was over Coles Bay. We could see the ferry going out for its first tour of the bay. It would be nice to do that trip, but we won't have time on this visit.
The walking path up to the Wineglass Bay lookout is very good. So good you could take a wheelchair or pram up most of the way. We took the climb steadily and made it up to the look-out where the views are just beautiful. A few hundred metres down from the look-out is the turn-off point for the walking track down to the beach. There were plenty of shaded seats for Barb to remain behind while John and Jess did the circuit down to the beach. It was a 90 minute return walk and looked quite steep.
Barb sat with the paper doing the crossword and chatted to passers-by. some even sat awhile to help with the cross-word! The numbers of hikers started to build up as the day wore on. It's a very popular place! Jess and John enjoyed their walk to the beach. Jess even braved the water for a paddle. It really was a steep walk back up and they had to stop several times along the way.
We drove back to Bicheno for a late lunch. It was just too busy in Coles Bay by this time to find anywhere to park there.
We tried a bakery cafe we'd seen a lot of people at last night. The food was very good and very plentiful. We were so full that we ended up just dining that evening on crackers cheese and fruit instead of going to the lovely Italian restaurant as planned. One of Barb's crossword helpers recognised her at the cafe and came over to our table to say hello. It's a friendly place.
The next morning we got away at 5.30 because we had to drive Jess back to Launceston to start of fourteen hour labour ward shift at 0800. Poor kid is going to be VERY tired after that long day.
We drove cross=country along the Lake Leake road to Campbell Town and then up to Launceston from there. It was a bit of a scary drive on this lonely road especially before dawn with a multitude of small animals trying to suicide in front of our hire car. We were so relieved to not hit anything. We delivered Jess safly to her place by 0730 and she had time for a quick shower before starting work. Phew!
Meanwhile we had to backtrack down towards Hobart. We stopped in Cambell Town again on our way through for a late breakfast, but then drove all the way through to Huonville without stopping.
John wanted a look around Huonville as he hadn't had a chance to properly see it earlier. The lady at the Information Centre tried to persuade us to visit the "Taste of the Huon" food festival which was going on at the time, but we were so tired we just wanted to get back to Jan and Nick's place and collapse.
It's been a fabulous week in Tassie and we definitely will be back to explore some more at a later date.
