DAY 52
4th February, 2021
Drove to Sheffield – the town of murals – to have a look around. The murals were everywhere, and they were nice. Definitely added some interest to the town.
We then drove over to Railton, which was supposed to be the town of topiary but there were only a couple that looked good. I think they might have grown out and not been maintained.
They did, however, have showers in the skatepark at $1 for 3 minutes. So while Josh redid the wheel bearings for the 100th time, I went to have a shower. He went after me after getting dirty from fixing the car.
We drove to Ulverstone to pick up groceries, then drove to a campsite that I suggested. It was hard to find good sites in Tassie, but this one was in a National Park down a lovely drive there at Leven Gorge.
We went for a walk around the gorge, with Josh doing the short walk while I walked down lots of stairs to the bottom lookout. The view was incredible. It was only by accident that we found this place and it really blew us both away!
We went back to the campsite and Josh did an oil change on the car (we took it with us back to Ulverstone to drop off at Supercheap) and we had a lovely night surrounded by pademelons and quiet bush.
DAY 53
5th February, 2021
We woke up to absolutely horrible weather and the forecast said that it wasn’t going to get much better. We packed up and went back to Ulverstone, having lunch at a greasy spoon there because it was pouring rain and neither of us felt like making lunch. We decided to drive back out to Forest to camp there again (we’d already stayed there on 11th January), and we got there and set up. There was nowhere really that was out of the wind - we’d pulled in tight to a row of trees and a fence but it was still blowing a gale. The only good spot at the campsite for windy days was taken by a caravan – of all the people who do not really need shelter from the wind.
We stayed for a little while, but checking the Bureau of Meteorology, there was a proper storm coming and it wasn’t predicted to get much better. So I looked on Booking.com and there was a hotel somewhat nearby with rooms for $50. We decided it was worth it. We boiled the jug and filled the thermos with water so we could have noodles for dinner, and spent the night inside. Good thing as well, because the wind and rain outside sounded atrocious all night!
DAY 54
6th February, 2021
We left the hotel after eating breakfast in the hotel and preparing a thermos of hot water for the day. We started doing the Tarkine Drive to Edith Creek, which was lovely. We saw the Arthur River in the fog. The drive itself wasn’t overly interesting, just through the state forest.
It got brighter later on which was good, as it was still a little bit miserable. We decided to go to Pioneer Park campsite, which was our favourite site in Tasmania! The park itself had a camp kitchen which was awesome - two stoves, a microwave, a kettle, a couple of undercover tables! There were also toilets and showers in a pretty nice, clean block.
That night there was a wedding in the park, which was a bit rowdy but not too bad.
DAY 55
7th February, 2021
We packed up and drove to Penguin to have a look at the markets, the biggest in Tassie. We weren’t too impressed, they didn’t even have much in the way of food! We went for a look around Penguin before going back to Pioneer Park and spending a quiet day there. We were back on the ferry the next day, so had to get up fairly early and Pioneer Park was the closest camp that wasn’t ridiculously expensive. It was a nice, quiet evening.
DAY 56
8th February, 2021
Ferry to Melbourne. Thank goodness the Superbowl was on TV because it gave us something to watch for hours. The water was also very calm, being the middle of the day. Was too hard to find a campsite for the night - nothing at all near Melbourne - so we booked a cheap hotel room with outside parking for the night in Dandenong.
DAY 57
9th February, 2021
We’d booked a campsite in Wilson’s Prom for two nights so we drove there today. Holy shit it was windy though, and the campsite was terrible, no shelter at all from the wind, and the sites with a bit of shelter were taken up by caravans - the people who realistically don’t need it as much as, say, people in tents. But we managed to get our washing done and we found an ok site tucked into some scrubby trees.
