Tassie's natural wonders include the Three Capes Track, which takes in Australia's highest seacliff. Photo / Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service
Tassie's natural wonders include the Three Capes Track, which takes in Australia's highest seacliff. Photo / Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service
Towering cliffs and other-worldly rock formations are just some of the highlights of Tasmania’s Three Capes Track,and you can experience it all without having to rough it, writes Patricia Maunder.
The Three Capes Track is one of Australia’s iconic tramps – or bushwalks as they say on the West Island. On a particularly wild peninsula almost as far south as you can go on the island, it offers epic coastal vistas both of and from atop the nation’s highest seacliffs. That, plus the moderate skill and fitness required means spots are limited for this self-guided experience that includes trailhead transfers and bunk beds.
I could have walked the Three Capes Track. I could have carried all the gear and food required and stayed in shared huts whose basic comforts don’t extend to showers. I could have but, to be honest, that’s not for me. I love exploring nature, just as long as I can clean it off after a day of travelling light, and eat its bounty in non-dehydrated form.
With a tour company to take care of the boring bits, it's possible to soak up the scenery without having to haul a pack or forgo hot showers. Photo / Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service
Which is why I’m doing Life’s An Adventure’s guided Walk Three Capes three-day experience. It explores similar territory in Tasman National Park, but after each day’s tramping, you can put down your daypack and wash, wine, dine and sleep in comfort. Nature without the unpleasant bits – at least that’s the plan as our group of 12 walkers and two guides gather at the meeting point in Hobart.
The island state of Tasmania’s capital, which has direct flights from Auckland, is blessed with 19th-century heritage, exciting food and drinks, and the audacious Mona - Museum Of Old and New Art so is well worth exploring for a few days. It’s not so appealing in this early morning rain, but we step into a minivan and hope for the best at our destination about an hour away: the Tasman Peninsula.
Hobart's restaurant and art scene is humming and well worth a look before setting off for the track. Photo / Tourism Tasmania, Alastair Bett
Here we pause for hot drinks and a briefing at Rosedale Homestead, a pleasant country combo of casual dining, local-heritage museum and animal sanctuary for everything from camels to cockatoos. It will prove a welcoming haven several times over the coming days. According to guides Casper Murrell and Peter Choate, the weather is going to make things interesting. They are realistic, informative and positive so, despite grey, wet skies, spirits are good as we begin the 15-kilometre return Cape Raoul walk.
Spirits are soon lifted even higher when we spy a pademelon, the kangaroo’s small, cute cousin endemic to Tasmania. The precipitation pauses long enough for cheery birds to welcome us, as do abundant, brilliantly coloured wildflowers all along the trail, including bush peas whose buttercup yellow faces blush red at the centre. Blue gum, stringybark eucalyptus trees and she-oak – whose soft needles, Casper reveals, can be broken off then reattached – give way to wetland where a chorus of frogs sing.
The only thing missing is those famous views, which the Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service describes as “stunning”, “breathtaking” and “jaw-dropping” on this trail. At each lookout, there’s nothing but dense cloud and the tantalising sound of surf up to 300 metres below. Sometimes Casper shows photos of what we could have seen: dramatic, fluted cliffs of volcanic dolerite against blue ocean and sky. Our collective “awww!” blends disappointment with amazement.
Apparently, columns of dolerite are gathered like a Middle Earth fortress somewhere in the sea of whiteness at Cape Raoul’s point, where we pause for lunch. The British Navy used this formation for target practice, says Pete, as he boils water on a camp stove. There’s no vista, but sitting around on rocks with hot drinks and genial conversation feels good all the same.
As does the post-walk civilisation. At Stewarts Bay Lodge we’re reunited with our luggage and settle into roomy self-contained private chalets nestled in bushland. The waterfront views aren’t at their best in this weather, but the king-size bed looks considerably more inviting than a bunk. Dinner is usually at the lodge’s restaurant and bar, but unexpected circumstances send us back to Rosedale for a generous meal.
Dramatic Tasman Island is just one of the jaw-dropping sights along the state's iconic trail. Photo / Tourism Tasmania, Jason Charles Hill
The change of plan on day two is more significant. At Rosedale for breakfast, where we watch the rain falling at a 45-degree angle, Pete advises that the usual 19-kilometre trail will be like a creek with occasional waterfalls. “None of you signed up for that kind of extreme experience,” he says. We strongly agree and welcome Pete’s Plan B. As the day unfolds, I suspect he also has to draw on Plans C and D.
We begin in a rain-swept car park overlooking the eroded coastal sandstone formation called Tasman Arch, where salty spray flies up 50 metres to splatter our faces. The guides ask if anyone wants to be driven back to the lodge.
It seems everyone’s senses are invigorated, however, so we walk toward Patersons Arch (where each wave rebounds off the cliff before crashing violently into the incoming wave following) and Waterfall Bay. The eponymous waterfall that usually marks the second-day itinerary’s starting point can be a disappointing trickle apparently, but today a torrent tumbles down the sheer cliff.
Walkers can get up-close views of Patersons Arch. Photo / Tourism Tasmania, Geoffrey Lea
As we head inland and upward and eucalypts give way to temperate rainforest tree ferns and moss, the trail grows tougher. It’s muddy, trees toppled by this wild weather must be climbed over or under, and occasionally we skip across ephemeral streams.
Like crossing the impromptu creek that to my eye looks too wide to leap over. Pete’s experience leading wetsuited canyoning tours in New Zealand comes to the fore; he walks into the rushing water and indicates with a stick where to step and spring. I make a leap of faith and am surprised, indeed thrilled to stick the landing.
Just ahead we encounter two gushing waterfalls – one of which is the trail. No challenge is offered, and not long after, the consensus is we should call it a day. I’m drenched, muddied and unnerved by several leeches I pick off before they can do any damage. I’m also exhilarated by this adventure I would not have attempted without encouraging guides. Indeed, I probably wouldn’t have made it out the door in this rain.
When the weather's playing ball, sandy Fortescue Bay is another highlight of the walk. Photo / Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service
This is the day when being able to wash, wine, dine and sleep in comfort could not be more welcome. With boots by the heater and clothes in the washing machine, I watch the downpour from my chalet’s hot, bubbling spa bath, before dinner at nearby 1830 Restaurant and Bar. The premium dining venue at Port Arthur Historic Site’s newish visitor centre, it overlooks picturesque ruins of this early 19th-century convict penal settlement. We reward our hard labour with local fare such as octopus, steak and sparkling wine.
The morning of day three is dedicated to trampers’ choice of pre-booked experiences to see Cape Pillar: an eco-cruise, scenic helicopter flight, or heli-hike option, which includes a guided walk on Tasman Island and air transfer back to Hobart. Choppers aren’t going anywhere in this weather, so we’re all headed to the jetty after a briefing that leaves us in no doubt conditions will be very rough. The seasickness ginger tablets are accepted like candy.
Departing Port Arthur, where we enjoy views of this popular attraction’s convict heritage from the water, the open boat heads out into the Southern Ocean. We bounce across ominous waves or bob around like a cork in the heavy swell when we stop to see the sights.
We gape at cliffs of horizontally layered mudstone or vertical dolerite, which also forms Cape Pillar’s jagged, towering sea stack now wreathed with cloud. Waterfalls pour into the sea like the crew of two have never seen in their 10 years doing this cruise. Fur seals glide and groom in the water, flippers poking up as if in salutation. A large pod of dolphins corral a feast of fish, diving in unison again and again. Dozens of shearwaters dart back and forth with astonishing synchronicity just above the waves, and an albatross glides by serenely.
From plunging cliffs to jagged islands, epic coastal scenery is a given on the Three Capes Track. Photo / Tasmania Parks and Wildlife Service
After the wet and wild experiences of the previous 24 hours, the 10-kilometre return Cape Hauy walk seems tame at first. Showers are merely intermittent, and while there’s more than one waterfall literally on the trail they are very much garden variety, cascading prettily down well-made sandstone steps. We walk through woodland and heath, sometimes glimpsing sea and distant cliffs.
Finally, at land’s end, there’s nothing but epic coastal panorama. Sky and water are far from picture-perfect blue but perhaps the organ-pipe cliffs and sea stacks are best experienced on days like this with turbulent clouds, waves and wind. It’s nature untamed – raw, restless and indifferent to the plans of mere mortals. Having been reminded of this over recent days, I’m even more certain that my enjoyment of Mother Nature’s wonderfully wild embrace hinges on starting and ending the day warm, clean, dry and well-fed.
