Freycinet Peninsula National Park
Once the washing was on the line, we headed back south about 20km to visit the Freycinet Peninsula National Park. This is an amazing collection of peaks (400-500m high) with many walking trails and beautiful sandy beaches. The photo on the first page of this blog (taken from the plane as we descended into Hobart) is quite by coincidence this peninsula! There are any number of walks from multi-day to 1-1.5 hours. After discussing the options with the lovely person in the Information Centre, we chose to walk up to the Wineglass Bay lookout. This is about 3km and 1.5 hours return. However, it is also a long way up and down again. The scenery is incredible with massive granite boulders everywhere, Some seem to be hovering on the brink of falling on you but clearly they don't move much these days! The way the track has been built is a tribute to the work that the powers-that-be have put into making this a wonderful experience.
Miriam was a bit puffed when we got to the top but managed it quite well. We had half a Panini at the lookout point and then were preparing to head back down when another walker asked if we were going down the other side to walk on the beach at Wineglass Bay. This was another 1.5 hour return trip down to the beach and back up. I decided it sounded like my kind of fun and so we set off separately! Miriam back down to the carpark and me down to Wineglass Bay then back. I move pretty fast by myself and made it down to the beach in just over 30 minutes and after taking a few photos headed back up and over the same way we had come. I arrived about 20 minutes after Miriam did so it all worked out very well.
By now we were pretty stuffed so headed back to Bicheno. We stopped for a quick snack and a beer at the Freycinet Marine Farm. They farm oysters and mussels so we downed two half-dozen raw oyster platters - one with a selection of Aussie bush flavours and the other with Nam Jim (a Thai sauce).
