Slept mostly ok although apparently I was poking Stu with my feet during the night.
My muscles still hurt. Yesterday I was in a lot of pain doing stairs. Getting better today though.
Used hotel milk to have cereal in the room. Checked out around 8:50 and left our bags with the hotel.
And off we headed to Port Arthur. The weather forecast was for utter crap, so we were debating going down to Remarkable Cave first. But in the end decided to go to Port Arthur first before it got too crowded.
As it turned out, this was absolutely the winning decision, because for the first hour after we get there at 9:20 it was sunny and uncrowded. So I tore off into the site to photograph as much as I could before the weather turned, while leaving the sweetie to get coffee.
Port Arthur Historic Site
The Penitentiary
Commandant's House
Turret near the guard tower
Officer's quarters
View over Port Arthur Historic Site
The hospital
Southwest wall of the convict church
St David's Anglican Church
Northwest wall of the convict church
The convict church
Government Cottage
View over Port Arthur Historic Site. It started raining a few minutes later
At 10:30 the weather did in fact turn and it started pouring with rain. So we huddled in the café with stoopidly priced coffee and a croissant (that little tiny sachet of jam cost $2.50 .. !!!!)
Once the rain cleared we headed off again.
Firstly to the Broad Arrow Café (site of the Port Arthur Massacre), and then out to the dock area. There I saw a British couple who had a little pamphlet for the park and I asked them where they got it (I literally looked all around the entrance area but couldn't find any). They said there was a whole wall of them at the entrance, but they said they were done and I could have theirs as they had another one in their car. So that was super nice of them.
Shell of the Broad Arrow Cafe, site of the Port Arthur Massacre
Lime kiln
Shipmakers sculpture
I went down to the jetty to confirm that all the cruises had in fact been cancelled (Stu overheard someone in the café earlier). But they didn't bother to put up any signs at all, so people were hanging around confused and wondering what was happening. Hopeless.
Port Arthur jetty. The weather was too rough to go on the boat
Then we wandered back to the main site and had a long look around. Taking shelter every so often from passing rain showers. We did happen to be at the Penitentiary in time for a talk which was quite interesting and informative.
Cells in the penitentiary
Cell in the penitentiary
The back of the penitentiary
Law courts
The drawing room in the Commandant's House
Kitchen in the Commandant's House
Guard Tower
Model of Port Arthur
Smith O'Brien's Cottage. My Mum stayed here when it was a Youth Hostel
Paupers Mess
Paupers Mess
The Asylum (Town Hall)
Interior of the Asylum/Town Hall
We had a stoopidly overpriced sandwich ($9.50) at the Asylum Café (but didn't look at the museum because it was getting "late" (even though we still had plenty of time we were getting stressed because everything always takes us longer than we think)).
Then had a look at the Separate Prison and the outside of the cottages.
Exercise yards in the Separate Prison
Cell in the Separate Prison
Chapel in the Separate Prison
Corridor in the Separate Prison
I then walked up to the Scorpion Rock lookout and managed to get some photos of the site in the sun (it would come and go only lasting seconds at a time).
View over Port Arthur Historic Site from Scorpion Rock Lookout
View the Convict Church from Scorpion Rock Lookout
Convict Church
Interior of the Convict Church
Tower in the Convict Church
Government Gardens
Seed head in Government Gardens
We left the site at Dentist Time. I still didn't find the wall of pamphlets. The site is definitely well worth seeing, and yeah could have easily spent the whole day there. Tickets give you two consecutive days, but we have way too much to do in Hobart to go back.
When I was trying to geotag my parents' photos there was one photo I could only imagine was taken somewhere along Lookout Road. But there was no street view there or even anyone's uploaded photos. The only stuff on Lookout Road looked like private property. Well as we were driving into the site I saw the road, and there was a sign that said "lookout closed". Welp there you have it. So took a photo of the sign on the way out.
View to Cape Pillar in Tasman National Park
We couldn't get to a lookout Dad took a photo from in 1971
Got to Maingon Lookout and nearly got blown away. It was wild and the surf was crazy (although I didn't get any good photos of the waves on the rocks).
Coastline at Remarkable Cave
Then went down to Remarkable Cave. Stu was worried about me getting washed out to sea, but there's actually a really good pathway. It was pretty remarkable. The parents' photos don't do it justice. But then again, I was there during wild weather, and the waves came rushing into the cave and filling the whole area with fluffy foam that went everywhere including leaving sand in my mouth (!?).
Entrance to Remarkable Cave
Remarkable Cave
Remarkable Cave
On the way back we nearly hit a massive 4WD that just pulled out of a t-intersection in front of us. !!! OMFG we were so close to hitting it but the sweetie slammed on the brakes (lucky we weren't going too fast) and we JUST missed it. We were both a bit rattled after that.
Because the weather was so wild I thought it might be good to look at the Eaglehawk Neck blowhole, but it wasn't being very exciting. Oh well. Bought the sweetie an ice cream at the food truck to help ease his nerves.
Blowhole near Pirates Bay
Then we popped back into our hotel to pick up our suitcases and re-tetris the car then off we went to Hobart.
Mt Wellington was in the clouds but the bridge was very pretty.
Clouds over Mount Wellington
Tasman Bridge
Negotiated the city traffic (hurray for 17:00 Sunday instead of 17:00 Monday) and got to the hotel in one piece.
Managed to get everything to our room. We have an apartment style room which is very nice. Lots of space and well appointed. Only complaint so far is we only get a minibar fridge not a real fridge, so no keeping ice cream for the sweetie.
I went to Woollies to pick up some supplies (including tv dinners as the sweetie didn't have the brain space for eating out) and then we listened to the Port Arthur audio guide, which was quite interesting, but wouldn't have been practical to listen to during the day.
Then it was gps/photos/blogging/bed.
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