Day 22 – Boxing day – Bruny Island     

Today we got up late and left the cabin just on 10:00 we drove out of town and headed for Bruny Island, on the way we stoped at Huonville to get some more supplies.  The lady at the counter asked as how our Christmas was, we really didn’t have much to say as our Christmas really was not that exciting, so she told us all about hers, which made me think of home and miss the normal family get together.

  We went to the town of Kettering which is where you board the ferry to get to Bruny Island, it cost us $30 to get here which it definitely better value than the Barge trip in Corinna.  We didn’t even have to wait long after paying.  We lined up and sat in the car a bit before John  went off to get some info about the island while we waited.  He also managed to book a boat trip for the tomorrow, saving us some time which was great.  The ferry trip took about 20min and there were a lot of other cars crossing with us.  It really wasn’t all that exciting or interesting but it was worth the trip over.

 We decided it would be best to drive to our camp site and then do some side trips from there so we headed to the south side of the island.  We drove to Cloudy bay choosing to follow our 4WD guide book.  While we were driving Jo spotted an albino wallaby in the bushes.  It sure did stand out.  Apparently someone released some albino wallabies many years ago, and they were able to breed.  There are few predators on Bruny, so they quickly multiplied and can be found all over the island.  Not long afterwards we stoped at some falls which were supposed to be a short walk from the picnic ground but we didn’t get to find out what they looked like because the path which normally crossed a slow moving stream had turned into a deeper fast stream following the recent rain, so all we could do was look at the other side and wonder how we would get there.  After some failed attempts to bridge the creek with logs and sticks not wanting to expose ourselves to more leaches we gave up.

 Continuing on our way just a little disappointed we took some back routes to find our way to Cloudy bay, we went for a short drive along the beach to check out the campsites at the other side of the bay, they were pretty busy and we were a bit worried that if we camped there for the night that we may not get out in the morning if it was high tide, so we opted for the safer alternative at the pine camp ground just before the beach, which is a nice spot just a little boggy in spots.

 After setting up the tent we decided to go to the lighthouse.  It was a nice drive apart form all the idiots who have no idea how to drive on windy dirt roads, we were almost pushed off the road a couple of times from people who hogged the whole road around the corners, I almost knocked out the back of one car with my bull bar after it came flying around the corner in the middle of the road, I dived off onto the rough dirt mounds on the edge of the road which bounced the car around everywhere.  I could almost see the guy driving turn white as my car bounced around getting close to him.  We weren’t very surprised to find a car had driven over the edge a little further up the road and was sitting on its roof in the bushes below.  The emergency services were already there getting it back up.  It was all very frustrating and then to make it worse we arrived at the light house only to find it was closed to visitors, we were late by a half hour.

So again we were off deciding to stop for dinner at a little takeaway store at Lunawanna were they make a pretty good burger and chips, we tried to stop for dinner by the beach but it was far to windy so we ate in the car.

 Our day at this moment was just not going the way we were hoping, I was definitely hoping for some kind of improvement.  Finally we headed to what they call the neck here on Bruny, this is where the north island meets the south it is a very thin stretch of land which contains a rookery for fairy penguins and mutton birds. 

The sign said that a Ranger would start giving a penguin ‘tour’ at around 2030hrs.  We were early and walked out on the beach for a while.  The Ranger turned up at 8:30 when the sun was still just above the horizon, well it wasn’t really the Ranger, it was a work experience guy who was working with the Rangers during his Uni holidays.  It was his first ever ‘tour’ and he hadn’t even seen the birds come in before, so I guess it was a first for all of us.  We chatted with him for a while until it got darker and other people started turning up, about 20 all up.  The “Ranger’ started giving his spiel and did a pretty good job, finishing a little before the birds started heading up the beach. 

I originally thought we had come to see the penguins parade up the beach but realised that the mutton birds were just as interesting.  We had been able to see flocks  of them flying around in their thousands out at sea with the binoculars earlier, and when it started getting dark they all came in overhead, darting around everywhere like some kind of old war planes dogfighting above us, it was really cool.  They are very good fliers, and very manoeuvrable.  The most amazing thing about them is that in winter they head North and fly 15000 km each way to the North pacific ocean and back.  They come back to Tasmania to nest every summer, I think I would prefer to find somewhere good in between and stay there all year.

 At the same time the mutton birds started flying in, the first group of penguins formed for their assault up the beach.  They gathered together at the edge of the waves and very cautiously started running, or waddling up the beach in a group sometimes deciding to go in single file climbing over little sand humps one after the other.  The first group had about 10 birds, but later bigger groups started coming, probably 50 birds in some groups.  A few of them were a bit braver and decided to go it alone too.  When they got to the edge of the grasses in the dunes they all huddled together and seemed to slowly make their way from the grass to their homes to meet their babies. 

By this time the muttonbirds were also coming to nest, they were really cool too because when they landed they did it with a thump, as if they suddenly lost power and thumped into the ground, then they would run or walk along a bit and just sat around wherever they felt was good, maybe they were just exhausted from flying around all day.  I think a lot of them went to their nests too, but a lot seemed to be just sitting around.

With all the Mums and Dads coming home, all the baby birds started going crazy, they were squawking and squabbling and making a real commotion in the same place that was nice and peaceful only half an hour ago.  Overall it was a really surreal experience, with birds overhead and below everywhere coming in from their hard days work.

 When we finally decided it was time to leave, it was dark and we had to be careful driving at night with all the wildlife on the Island.  The first wildlife we came across were penguins, they were all over the sides of the roads looking for their homes, so we had to drive carefully past.  There was also a muttonbird that had decided to park itself in the middle of the road, and didn’t want to move.  I drove up beside him, yelled at him, opened the door, flashed the lights and everything, and he still decided he had found a good spot, so leaving him unconvinced  of moving I kept driving.  Further on I spotted a rabbit, so I headed straight for it hoping I would knock out one more feral animal.  Just as I was getting close and the lights lit him up better I realised it was not a rabbit, but a little Quoll with spots on his back and a little white tail, so I jammed on the brakes and got out of his way, whoops, almost knocked off an endangered animal.  As we drove on, we did come across rabbits, but I wasn’t able to run any of them over, they are a bit quicker than quolls.  There was also a family of 5 possums on the road.  They were big dark and furry ones with little pink noses and fluffy tails.  They were wondering around on the road and slowly decided to get out of our way after we stopped and gawked at them for a while.  So it was an interesting trip back. 

We noticed a few tents had appeared since we left, but we weren’t too worried and went straight to bed.

4WD Tasmania hiking penguin photo