I was woken up by Yuting’s excited screaming ‘Wake up! Puppies! I brought the puppies!’ I quickly ran out and found Yuting with mud all over him and two very excited black lab puppies jumping around him. Armani and Donnatella, the two 7 months old labs, who belong to the owner of Piermont Retreat, are the resident entertainers. The second they saw me they started jumping all over me leaving mud and sand on my only-one-day-new PA pants. And then our friend Eric came out from the cottage and sat down on the stairs and Donnatella started eating his hair. I miss Pascal!
It started pouring as we were eating our breakfast – not good. But you cant go to Tassie without seeing Wineglass Bay, so we ventured out anyway. It was a pleasant drive to Coles Bay and the staff in the information centre were friendly and helpful. We were suggested the short walk to Great Oyster Bay behind the information centre as a warm-up walk, where we were the only visitors and had the beach to ourselves.
We then drove further into the national park and made our way up to the Wineglass Bay Lookout. I have also realised that you have to register at a Walker Register Booth if you intent to do some bush walking in Tassie, which is great. I was thinking about how Yuting and I did part of the Great North Walk in Sydney a few years back and got terribly lost as the bush fire had burned down all the track markers. We went round and round in the bush and was thrilled when we saw this other group of bush walkers. I was a bit shocked to find that they were no-less-thrilled than us and to my surprise they were lost too!
With a bit of teamwork and lots of sliding down big boulders we did get out of the bush just after it got dark. I was really not happy and decided to write the Ku-ring-gai Nat Park an email just to complain and realised that the Great North Walk was closed due to the bush fire at the time. I mean, did they really think every single person was going to check the internet first before they decided to go for a wondering around the national park? I then rang the park to suggest them putting up a few signs at the entrances to the tracks so people don’t end up getting lost like us (not to mention we only had a pack of jelly babies with us – imagine if we had to spend the night in the bushes) and the guy over the phone was puzzled ‘signs?! There weren’t any?’
Anyway, so back to my point, I have only managed to visit Freycinet and Cradle Mountain/Lake St Clair National Park while in Tassie and I think they are the best national parks I have been to and definitely 10 times better than the ones around Sydney. The tracks were well made and maintained, the Walker registration is a good idea (I wonder if they are checked though) and the information on wild life and plants were great for nerds like me and Yuting.
The track to Wineglass Bay Lookout is categorised as ‘Moderate to Difficult’ and that really pumped me up, as this would be the opportunity for me to prove how fit I was after working out for THREE weeks before the trip. It didn’t end up being that difficult and it helped that it was drizzling so no-one suffered from over-heating.
I was really excited when I saw the bay – I have heard so many people talking about it and everything they said was true – it was stunning. It was kind of strange that all of us, trying to appreciate a beach that seemed so far away, but you feel grateful all the same as it is such a beautiful sight, the perfect arch, the white sand, the remoteness of it. It is time to leave and get some food.
We went to the ‘Freycinet Marine Farm’ expecting it to be some factory-like seafood shop with all sorts of seafood on display and was pleasantly surprised by how it really is just the backyard of someone’s house. An old dog was walking around enjoying the affection from kids and there were a couple of picnic tables where you could see people happily pigging out. We had a dozen of fresh oysters and a big bowl of freshly cooked mussels. I am not a huge fan of oysters so I cant comment on those here but the mussels were divine. They are much smaller than the mussels I normally see in seafood shops (I hope they are the Chihuahua type of mussels instead of baby ones) but they were so much yummier. Tasted great with a bit of balsamic vinegar too!
Before we headed back to Piermont Retreat we decided that a few oysters and baby mussels couldn’t be treated as proper afternoon tea so we dropped in Kate’s Berry Farm. Just like the Marine Farm, I expected Kate’s to be really commercial and touristy but it turned out to be a lovely, down-to-earth kind of place. Kate herself was behind the counter and the first thing she said was ‘We have been waiting for you’. She was amazing at whistling and it lifted out spirit too seeing her obviously loving what she does and is proud of what she has.
The food was definitely in line with all the rave reviews all over the brochures and information booklets. We had Devonshire tea (tea and scone with Kate’s berry jams) and the mixed berry waffles with berry ice cream. It was so nice that I was really tempted to lick the plate after we finished all the food, within, like, 10 minutes.
As a matter of fact, we are planning to go back to Swansea during Easter holidays next year, stay at Piermont Retreat, play with Armani and Donnatella, go walking in Freycinet, and go to Kate’s Berry Farm everyday!
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