Sometimes plans just don't happen the way you want them to. Even if it's on your birthday. But one thing's for sure, you should absolutely, definitely have cake on your birthday. Always. But today we didn't

Today we woke up later than planned due to aches and sores acquired from yesterday's hike. Oops! Didn't plan for that! (Well, I did actually put on some Deep Heat cream the night before but it was probably insufficient).

Port Arthur Historic Site

We got to the Port Arthur Historic Site by 9:30 am for the introductory tour, where a guide told stories and showed us some of the buildings. Port Arthur used to be a penal convict, where the most dangerous convicts were sent to do hard labour. Ultimately, it was a very harsh environment to be in, and under a modern lens, you could say it was inhumane due to the conditions, the methods employed to reform prisoners (e.g. silent prison) and the rules enforced on the prisoners. The prison operated for close to 50 years. After this, the site was left abandoned, with the buildings falling apart because of disuse. Some people purchased land here and demolished buildings. There was a fire. History was being lost. The town was renamed for a while to distance itself from its history. In the late 70s, the government stepped in to preserve and manage the site. At this time there were only a handful of residents.

The shape of the peninsula that Port Arthur sits on is bounded to the north by Eaglehawk Neck, an isthmus, which made the whole area south of Eaglehawk Neck an ideal place to keep convicts in one place. Should they escape Port Arthur, there were very few areas in which they could escape to as Eaglehawk neck was guarded by a line of dogs (The Dog Line), otherwise there was the cold waters of the Tasman sea.

After the tour, we were able to roam around freely, although a lot of the smaller buildings were closed due to covid restrictions. Due to the lack of time, we had to strategise about where to go to and focused on the more important buildings.

The Penitentiary

The Penitentiary is the most photographed building in Port Arthur. It used to be a flour mill and granary but then they ripped out all the old machinery to build living quarters for convicts. It featured 136 individual cells on the first two floors, a dining hall and a library on the third floor and on the top floor was a dormitory for prisoners with good behaviour.

(Best viewed on desktop and in full screen mode)

Separate Prison

(Best viewed on desktop and in full screen mode)

The Separate Prison was at the time, a new way to manage and reform prisoners. It was thought that instead of hard punishment, prisoners should put in solitary confinement and given time to contemplate their actions silently. However we now know that this is ineffective and inhumane.

There was space for each prisoner to exercise, which was also confined. The walls are being restored.

(Best viewed on desktop and in full screen mode)

I don't know if you remember The Mole but it was an excellent TV show from the early 2000s and the first season's finale/reveal was filmed here!

Asylum

The Asylum was next to the Separate Prison and unfortunately we were not allowed entry, probably a covid restriction. Wasn't it “nice” of them to stick the Asylum right next to the Separate Prison? You'd go mad in the latter then get transfered next door!

Commandant's House

We visited the Commandant's House where many of the fancy furnishings have been recreated and restored. Unfortunately half of the house was closed to visitors and covid restrictions meant that only a few could enter the house at one time. Whatever we saw looked quite grand and there were descriptions of each Commandant; it sounded like most of them lived well. I remember there were insinuations that there was a corrupt Commandant…

The Guard Tower

The Guard Tower was next to the house and was in excellent condition. I really appreciate sandstone structures and the skill and work required that goes into their construction.

(Best viewed on desktop and in full screen mode)

Hospital

Unfortunately not much of the hospital exists today, which is a real shame as it was a very large imposing sandstone building. It suffered two bush fires in the late C19th.

Other notable buildings were the Asylum and the ruins of the church. All of these impressive buildings were built with convict labour

Church

The exterior walls of the Church is nicely preserved and rather complete. It was constructed using convict labour using materials in the area. Inside the tower is a display of bells, which are supposedly the first church bells to be casted in Australia. According to the sign, there is one missing to this day.

Isle of the Dead

Our ticket also included a 20 minute boat cruise around the bay, which was nice to see the Port Arthur Historic Site from a distance away. We also got a look at the Isle of the Dead, which is where a decent amount of convicts were buried. Most of them had died due to disease.

The last thing we saw was the Memorial Garden. It was a peaceful place, appropriate for reflection.

At 12:30 pm we finally left, having felt we had seen most, if not all of the things. The only parts we missing really, were the buildings near the water. We were behind schedule and that was that.

Leaving Port Arthur

We stopped briefly at Port Arthur Lavender to buy some souvenirs. You could see from inside that they had just planted lavender and there wasn't really any to see. It was the wrong season. A bought a Lavender Hot chocolate which was interesting but a bit weird, but not too smelly. I also bought a jar of honey to take home.

We stopped at the Tessellated Pavement at Eaglehawk neck. The rock formations and erosion was interesting but there was not that much to see. I thought the view of the bay itself was nicer.

Back in the car we went and I drove for the first time. But apparently I was too slow so A took over after some time. Our next destination was an important one -

Melshell Oyster Shack

Melshell Oyster Shack closes at 4pm and isn't open every day. I had read it was quite good so we planned to go today and therefore it was imperative we did. We got there about 20mins before close. They were happy to have us and I ordered a half dozen (AUD 15) and some pickled octopus (AUD 12). A isn't big on oysters so we'd see how we would go.

Oh

MY

GOD.

First off, the oysters were huge. Fat. This was obvious when you put one on your palm, prepping it with lemon juice, before sliding it down your throat.

Secondly - they were SO FRESH. The lovely hint of salt water and lemon hits your nose immediately. Chew chew chew, but it's not actually chewy, it's got a nice bite and a little bit of resistence. Juices spill out. SO FRESH, NOT FISHY SMELLING, SO SWEET. Yes, sweet. I finally know what they mean when people say oysters are sweet. SO GOOD.

They were so good, that A had more than his usual 1 or 2. Usually he says oysters are too smelly, but not these ones, these were… not weird and fishy???

We finished the half dozen in very little time. So he offered to get another half dozen - YES PLEASE, THEY'RE GONNA CLOSE OMGUHSDFSDKFHDSFOMG QUICK.

SO GOOD.

Sydney rock oysters are shit. Basically all the other oysters I've ever had, whatever the hell they were, are also shit, just turd. This is the pinnacle, the best. Unbeatable.

Which means if I were to have another oyster again it would just be disappointing.

The Shack was located on a peninsular facing Swan river, which provided a nice view as we ate our food (too quickly). On the other side of this peninsular is the Nine Mile Beach, which faces Great Oyster Bay, what a fitting name. On the east side of the Bay is Freycinet National Park which is where Wineglass bay was located. The owners of the shack have oyster farms in this quiet and pristine bay. That's probably the secret to these oysters. It's not a heavily populated area, so not much pollution (not that Hobart is heavily polluted, but relatively).

Oh, you want to hear about the picked octopus? It was not even worth mentioning, it was not what I expected and a bit too vinegary. It was also very small. Another half dozen would've been money better spent.

Nine Mile Beach

We left Melshell, told the staff it was amazing but let's be real, they already knew. Drove across the small peninsular and had a look at the Nine Mile beach.

Wow, it was definitely a very long beach with very little people around. Well, I suppose it was April and cold but still.

The view was nice.

Bicheno

I drove us to our last stop of the day, Bicheno, as we were no longer on a schedule. We stopped at our accommodation and self-checked in. There was NO one around, which was frustrating as I had questions about penguins and where to find them.

Redbill Beach

We drove to Redbill beach and waited for penguins to come ashore. There were a few others doing the same thing as us. You could tell we were all waiting for something to happen. We were there just before sunset so I was able to have a good look at the beach, and check this out:

Who needs to go all the way to Bay of Fires when you can see orange coloured rocks right here in Bicheno?! Ha! This was situated on the eastern end of the beach.

At 6:30pm it was quite dark and nothing was happening. We had our red head lamps on but could see very little. I was getting hungry so we decided to leave

Lobster Shack

Originally my plan was to hit up Tasmanian Coastal Seafoods AND Lobster shack for dinner. So that would be a fish and chips and lobster for dinner. Sounds good, right? Womp womp. The former was closed because the owner had covid, which sucked as I read their F&C were quite good. So off to the latter only we went…

It was FULL of people, it was very popular, which could only be a good thing, right?

WRONG. After waiting 45 minutes for food, we dug in and omg the lobster was fucking overcooked. HOW does that even happen? Isn't this your signature dish? A was VERY displeased, silently seething, not that we could do a damn thing about it as it was basically this town's bedtime and the staff were closing up as we were eating. The only thing that could be worse than overcooked lobster was that the chips were absolutely god awful; little bits of floppy shoe string fries with insufficient amounts of salt. The fish fillets were too small and batter-y.

I have never ever in all my years, had fish and chips with shoe string fries. Ever. What a poor choice. Dare I say it's un-Australian.

Bicheno Blowhole

After dinner we quickly drove down to the servo before it closed. We had an early day tomorrow and servos weren't open early enough. Then we drove to Bicheno blowhole to try our luck again with the penguins. It was very dark but we found a picnic table easily, so we sat there and waited with our red headlamps. After a short period of time, we could hear twittering and some cat like noises, so A went to investigate.

Meanwhile, I was trying to get my camera to take night shots as the view of the stars was very good. You could just make out the milky way, it was lovely. The sound of the waves crashing into the rocks was nice.

It was cold and A came back empty handed, and my camera was just not suited for long exposure shots so we left. We needed to prepare ourselves for a big day tomorrow.

The accommodation was the absolute worst. It was bloody cold but the heating didn't work. It was set on a really low setting that you could not change and it was effectively NOT doing anything AND it had a timer. The electric blanket turned itself off quickly as well, it was like I was being nannied and not trusted to use the facilities. What the fuck was I paying for? The bed was also shit, it was springy and the pillow weak. Wifi did not work and you couldn't even get reception in the room, it was completely ridiculous. Difficult to sleep. Worst accommodation ever.

We probably shouldn't have cheaped out on the accommodation - if $121 can be called cheaping out (probably).

If only I had had cake.