more tales of tasmania

We are in Dover (43 19.169 and 147 01.337) which doesn't have white cliffs but is a sleepy attractive little town (called Dozy Dover) on the sheltered Port Esperance. If you look up our position you will see that we are tied to the end of the fishing jetty, rafted up to a lobster fishing boat. (We were a little concerned to see a small tail disappearing under some rope on our boat, pretty sure it was a lizard but......) Another boat has been unloading a huge catch of abalone this morning, 2 days work involving diving to 100 ft. They mostly get exported to Japan and Asia, quite a valuable haul. Gale force winds are forecast for today so it is unlikely any fishing boats will be leaving and hopefully we can stay put. (A gust of 42 knots as I write)

We sailed here on Friday, and Bdrove down and joined us on Sat. morning. B couldn't come as he had been offered the stone from a couple of chimneys of a cottage that had burned down; but it had to be moved this weekend before the bulldozers moved in. The three of us sailed south to Recherche Bay, at the edge of the huge Southwest National Park. Cockle Creek where we anchored (43 34.775 and 146 53.774) is the end of the South Coast walking track. A tough a 6 - 7 day hike carrying all your own gear up steep slopes and through deep mud and water. There is a bus from Hobart to Cockle Creek, and a small plane takes you back to Hobart from the other end.

Luckily the first part of the trail is a pleasant 2 hour walk to a spectacular beach facing the southern ocean. The big long waves roll in straight from Antarctica. We were lucky to have a sunny day with clear blue skies and it all looked magnificent. The water is pretty cool even at the end of the summer, so a paddle was enough for us, though B felt she had to make the most of the sunny day and dipped in. Another 2 hrs back to the boat, and we were ready to sit on board and admire the view with a G and T.

Fishing was interesting if not very productive for eating though we did catch three large squid on the way back yesterday. Tried one cut into rings and fried and it was pretty good. Barbara took the other two back so that she could look up some recipes and instructions on the internet. We have never caught squid while trawling before.

From here we will make our wind-dependent way back to Hobart, and probably next week will begin to head north again.