A Sampler Tour of Tasmania. Executive Summary.

Over the 22 days of this trip, I travelled almost 8,000 kms, including roughly 3,500 kms getting to and from Melbourne, leaving 4,500 kms of travel around Tasmania itself. Fuel was by far the most expensive part of the trip and I spent around $1,500. The average fuel economy for the whole trip was almost exactly 12 litres/100 kms which was not too bad considering the car was loaded up with camping gear and the Oztent was on the roof. I took just over 1000 photos with my Sony alpha DLT and another 250 photos using the iPhone 6 plus all of which have now been location tagged using the track I recorded using the Hema Explorer app on my iPad. 

As I said earlier in these blogs 18 days is not nearly enough time to see the whole of Tasmania properly and I now have a list of places that I can come back and spend much more time exploring. This includes the Arthur-Pieman Conservation Area and the whole north west corner, the region to the south of Hobart, the Bay of Fires and the north east corner, Hobart itself and the districts between it and Launceston. Next time I will aim for a warmer time of the year, probably February when the school holidays are over and hopefully I will dodge the bloody winds. 

The things I enjoyed were the beautiful scenery and pleasant little villages which seem to pop up almost anywhere. The bakeries and coffee shops in these small places are very good and I think I consumed an above average quantity of pies during the trip and came away with a hankering for curried scallop pies. Also, the local produce cheese, ham, bacon, etc. was very good and the seafood was exceptional and I am already missing the simple meal of flake in a thin batter and chips cooked to perfection. The national parks on the whole seem pretty well run and the 2 month pass for $60 is good value, otherwise it's $24 per day per car to enter most of the national parks. Camping in the parks is a tad on the expensive side but they do seem to offer good facilities. A lot of the conservation areas also offer free or cheap camping but only provide minimal facilities. Most of the caravan parks in the towns were nice, if a little expensive but at the end of a hard days touristing I find that a hot shower is required to aid in easing the aches and pains that seem to becoming more common as I am getting older. 

The road to and from Melbourne via Sydney is a relatively easy drive with dual lane separated highway existing for about 2/3 the distance. This is a great improvement over the old Newel Highway which I used to drive regularly when I lived in Melbourne. The ferry over to Tasmania is an exercise in waiting at different points of the boarding process and sleeping in the ocean recliners is not a comfortable experience. I think next time I may splash out a bit of extra cash to upgrade to a cabin. The experience of the ferry is great and they must employ a huge number of people, to get the cars and trucks loaded, work in the bars and restaurants on board and generally be pleasant and helpful. 

All up it was a very pleasant couple of weeks and I look forward to returning at some point in the future.