Hiking Freycinet National Park: Day 6, Wineglass Bay to Car Park to Hobart

It was another beautiful morning to wake up to, even if there was some reluctance about packing up camp.

We decided to get an early start in the hopes to avoid the day walkers by leaving the park by 8am. It was much quieter than the day before and we enjoyed the hike along a nearly empty beach.

The second time we did the climb up to the car park seemed much easier than the first try. Perhaps it was because we knew what we were in for. And when we stopped off at the look out, it was almost empty. At least for a few minutes.

We continued on our way without incident, though the closer to the car park we got, the more people we saw. What I'll never understand about some people is that there is a large sign out front of the entrance saying what to bring and wear, particularly for footwear. And yet, in spite of that there are still several people in thongs and ballet slippers doing the hike.

Watching people enter the park did keep me occupied for the following two hours that I had to wait for the shuttle bus. That, and catching up on Facebook. You can't avoid technology forever. Though it is nice to try sometimes.

And in almost a blink of an eye, I was on the Tassielink (gripping for dear life as the bus doesn't have seat belts) back to Hobart. And I was just in time to see all the 2010 Sydney to Hobart race boats at the harbourfront.
I'd be lying if I told you I had a big, crazy New Years. I fell asleep just before midnight--oops, the bed was soft. But, I did get to celebrate with a bottle of Tasmanian wine at the harbourfront and see some fireworks at the kid's firework display. It was still a nice way to end the year.

Hiking Freycinet National Park: Day 5, Wineglass Bay

We awoke and lightly packed our packs and had a hot breakfast of porridge and honey before heading off down the beach for the car park. We were greeted by the sight of two tall ships, The Young Endeavour and The One and All as they made a port stop in Wineglass Bay.

This also meant that there was already a crowd on the beach in front of us. But, we set off anyways and made for the steep climb to the car park. This was the least favourite of all my trails as it was full of day walkers by the time we reached it at about 10am. Already the other side of the beach was filling up with people who have trekked to the main attraction.

We did take a detour at the look out, but it was packed full of other tourists, each of them trying to get their photo taken. Needless to say after days without crowds, I was finding them a bit tiresome. All the de-stressing and communing with nature I had done over the past few days was being quickly forgotten.

With our water bottles full and lunch in our belly, we rushed from the car park and back to Wineglass Bay. I had felt some sadness and anxiety at the car park--it felt as though the trip had already ended. Reaching our campsite again, however, restored me with a sense of calm. We were still camping.

With a warm dinner in our belly, we clutched our terrible instant coffee and watched our last sunset at the park. I felt a sense of accomplishment that I had survived my first camping trip, excitement about tomorrow afternoon's shower and sadness over leaving. I suppose that makes it a success.

Hiking Freycinet National Park: Day 4, Cooks Beach to Wineglass Bay

The morning had come. We left the campsite by 7am after a quick morning of dressing and packing. Whether I was ready or not, we would be climbing up Mt Freycinet and Mt Graham and hiking over the saddle to Wineglass Bay-- the feature of Freycinet National Park and our final campsite.

After crossing the beach, we stopped for a quick breakfast of muesli bars and stripped off our extra layers because we new the steep climb through the forest would be a lot warmer than the trek across a windy beach first thing in the morning. And once we had no more reasons to stall anymore, we set started our ascent.

After a few hours of hiking through the eucalyptus forest, we can to the rock cairn that marked the separate climb to Mt Freycinet. We'd been planning for this side hike and we started down the path, finding a good spot to hide our packs while we continued on scrambling up rocks to the summit. The path up Mt Freycinet was not well marked, though several rock cairns had been put up in place of the occasional orange arrow.

As we continued to climb, we got a few glimpses of the view we were about to have.

But it wasn't until after we scrambled up the last few granite rocks and popped out the trees did we really get an amazing 360 degree view. It was worth the climb.

We sat there for some time, soaking in the view of the beaches and trees far below. We could see back to the tip of the peninsula and to Schouten Island.

But eventually we started to feel hungry and decided to head back down to pick up our packs and have a quick lunch before continuing on. We met a few women on the way down and said hello before scrambling down the rest of the rocks.

After a relaxing lunch, Shannon and I set off for Mt Graham feeling optimistic. That was quickly destroyed as the hike up Mt Graham felt steeper and more difficult with a pack on. Every time I climbed up another granite rock, I felt I had to struggle to stand up again with an extra 15 kgs weighing down on me. Partway up we were stopped by a man asking if we had seen his son. This question shocked us as we had seen no one. And the thought of losing someone in a National Park sounded terrifying. I could only imagine the thoughts going through his head as he asked us before continuing on.

As it turned out, a father, mother and two sons had hiked up from Wineglass Bay for a day hike. The older son (who turned out was about 14) had gone ahead of the group and once the family reached the summit of Mt Graham lost all sight of him. For about two hours the father searched around the trails for his son as the mother and younger son traveled back to the camp. As it turned out, the son had run on ahead and as there was the side trail for Mt Freycinet, the father and son kept missing each other.

I take it as a lesson about why it's very important to stick with the group out in the wilderness. While that kid was tall and reasonably smart (I say reasonably smart because he did run off from him family and leave them panicking about his safety for several hours), he still could have slipped and hit his head. The path was not well marked around Mt Graham and the granite rocks were large and some of them were wet and slippery.

Thinking of the family made the walk along the saddle a quiet one. By the time we started our long and winding descend to Wineglass, we were feeling a bit tired.

Aching, sore, hungry and tired, we finally saw the rot-a-loo, signifying we had reached the campsite. I was about ready to collapse and had already managed to suck my hydration bladder dry. It didn't help that it had been the warmest day of the trip so far that we chose to hike those 14kms.

Both Shannon and I were a bit cranky and it took three tries of setting up the tent and taking down the tent at three different locations before we found one that we both liked and that was secluded enough so that we didn't have to see other campers. This was by far the busiest campsite and the least nice.

The sand was like dirty ash and got everywhere for starters. It was the smallest campsite, but had the most amount of people and many of them large and talkative groups. And to finish it off the rot-a-loo was the most used and therefore the worst smelling of all of them. It also didn't help that there was a huge spider in one of the stalls. Not that I close the doors on the rot-a-loo to use them, I'm afraid I'd die of asphyxiation in there.

But after a nap out of the hot, late afternoon sun and a snack overlooking the beach, things didn't seem so bad anymore. Except for the fact that we had less than one litre of water left and another full day in the park. Instead of spending a day playing in the water (it was too cold anyways) and relaxing on the beach, we had to make the decision to hike out to the carpark a day early to get more water and hike back. There was no water to treat at Wineglass Bay and so hiking out was our only option.

So, after enjoying a hot dinner and a sunset on the beach, we turned in early for another day of hiking.

Hiking Freycinet National Park: Day 3, Bryans Beach

Waking up to blue skies, white sand and turquoise water (no matter how cold it might be) is paradise, plain and simple. Even if you haven't showered in three days and the wind is a bit cold, it's still paradise. We weren't ready to take Mt Freycinet today, so we'd planned for a side trip down to Bryans Beach for a few hours.

After a pancake feast, we left the tent and took our packs down to Bryans Beach on the Southern end of the peninsula, across from Shouten Island.

The path looked somewhat overgrown and quite obviously less traveled, but the climbing around and over fall trees and branches was worth it and we were left with a near empty white sand beach. Bryans Beach didn't have many visitors on foot, but it certainly had several boats anchored around.

It was a perfect, lazy, sunny afternoon to dip your feet in the cool water and walk along the warm sand. I also did a fair bit of climbing around the sand dunes to find Bryans Lagoon, which was marked on the map.

After a lunch trail mix and mountain bread dipped in peanut butter, Shannon and I made the hike back to Cooks Beach. The good thing about hiking in December is that the days are the longest and the weather is usually still quite cool. We were fortunate with sunlight by 6am and it lasted until after 9pm. We actually got very little use out of the lanterns we brought with us--except to read The Hobbit aloud at night.

By the time we returned to our tent, there were already about eight other tents set up for the night, but since they were set up far away, we almost didn't know any of them were there. After a hearty dinner and a cup of the last hot chocolate, we turned in after watching some of the sunset. Tomorrow, we were going to find out what hiking is really like.

Hiking Freycinet National Park: Day 2, Hazards Beach to Cooks Beach

After a night of rain and dropping temperatures as we slept cramped in our two man tent (we will later come to realise that of all the campers in Freycinet, we may have the smallest--and likely lightest--tent around), we awoke to a brisk, windy and clear day 2 of our adventure. After dressing, we hiked over to the Rot-a-loos (a foul smelling invention, but this was the cleanest of the three, Wineglass Bay not only smelled the worst, it was inhabited by a spider larger than my palm). As the hike to Cooks Beach only took about two hours, we took our time packing up camp and making a warm breakfast, including mochas.

The view at Hazards Beach was beautiful, despite the freezing winds--so much for summer in Tasmania.

Just before midday, we set out for Cooks Beach, taking our time to enjoy the woods. Not too much time, for as I was leading the way, I spotted some a few metres on that was not a stick. Rather, it was one of the three snakes native to Tasmania--and all of them poisonous.

Fortunately, I kept my distance and live to tell the tale of my first Australian poisonous snake sighting. Outside of the zoo or museum of course. I made Shannon lead the rest of the hike to Cooks Beach (boy, my investment in gaiters paid off). Through the trees, Cooks Beach came into view--yet another white sand beach with turquoise water. We walked across to the opposite side of the beach to the campsite. This time we were not the only campers; a couple had set up camp after kayaking in. However, we managed to find a site with a view and set up camp for the next two nights.

Of the three campsites in Freycinet, this was the best. That view definitely has something to do with it.

Hiking Freycinet National Park: Day 1, Carpark to Hazards Beach

With our water bladders and Nalgene bottles filled, we climbed aboard the Tassielink--complete with no seat belts--and set our sights for the tiny town of Coles Bay and Freycinet National Park. Now, I had said that we had never done any hiking this before and it's completely true. But knowing the kinds of gear we needed, I put a lot of research into what products to buy.

For shoes I refused to compromise on some cheap hiking boots--the last thing I wanted was blisters and having to drag around heavy hiking boots on my feet for 6 days. I settled on Hi-Tec's V-Light Altitude hiking boots. I broke them in for a few weeks and then on the trip and they did not disappoint. For holding our gear, we purchased Deuter Aircontact hiking packs. I purchased the 50 + Litre Slimline series, specifically designed for women. It was worth paying the money for these packs as mine was extremely comfortable despite carrying 20kgs.

The park doesn't guarantee water (though it's been a wet season and there was some) so we planned for no water and carried a minimum of 7 litres each. It wasn't the recommended 3-4 litres per person, per day, but we made it almost 5 days with it.

From the car park, it's about a four hour journey to the Hazards Beach campsite. With overcast skies, we slowly made our way around Mount Mayson, the first hazard.

I was eager this walk as we were trying out something new and the terrain was gentle. Arriving at Hazards Beach felt like the accomplishment of the day, but the beach seemed to go on forever.

it was actually getting to the campsite that felt like the real accomplishment. Dropping our heavy packs, Shannon and I set up camp for the night, putting together our modest two-mean Denali x-wind tent up for the second time ever (the first time was in our Melbourne apartment). Aside from a panic to find the tent stakes, everything went smoothly and we set up our camp stove for dinner. Around the same time, a few visitors joined us at the empty campsite.

I admit I've never seen a wombat in the wild! Sore and aching, we ended our first night as the only people at the Hazards Beach campsite. We were sore and cold, but feeling rather proud.

Hiking Freycinet National Park: Christmas in Hobart

I have never been trekking before or on any overnight camping trip that involved carrying everything in a pack and hiking from campsite to campsite. Like most things, the idea struck me at work one day, while I was feeling run down and tired with all things technological, electronic and modern. I had probably also tired of barking dogs, public transport and the general crowds of people who always seem to be in your way whenever you need to get anywhere quickly.

I used to be a sailor--a tall ship sailor. But constant moving and the process of growing up has put me away from that lifestyle and form of escape. It was time I came up with a new escapist hobby. After all, I'm already used to rationing showers and eating less than gourmet style food. So with no experience--and my husband with about as much experience as me, aside from both of us knowing about the outdoors from Scouts or summer camps--we hatched a plan to hike for 6 days and 5 nights in Freycinet National Park in Tasmania.

It would rejuvenate us as well as get me far away from the depressing holidays. That is, if we lived to tell the tale. After months of research on the park, and hours spent researching trekking gear and trekking meal plans and how to treat snake bites, Christmas Day arrived. We had booked our flights to Hobart and our buses to the park and had our park passes safely packed with all our gear. It was time for two "green" hikers to set off.

I had never been to Tasmania before and I fell in love with Hobart the moment I saw it. It could be the harbour front, alive with fishing boats, sailing yachts and tall ships that had me hooked.

I surprised myself with eating a fresh fish fry from one of the many fish and chip places along the water--Fish Frenzy happened to be along to the docks where many floating fish and chip shops make their berth. I must say, when I eat fish, I manage to pick well.

I had to remind myself that would probably be the last decent meal for a few days, because the next day--after visiting Hobart's famous Saturday morning Salamanca Market--we'd be heading off to Freycinet via the Tassielink bus system.

As with most holidays in Australia, Christmas Day brought and emptiness to Hobart that would be gone on our return on New Years Eve. The streets were empty, save mostly tourists like ourselves.

It was a low key Christmas in a beautiful little city found on the River Derwent. But it was the next 6 days that tested me, my husband and my newly acquired gear.