MOT Tour Day 45 - Hell's Gate, Sarah Island & The Gordon

A few days ago, we stood beside the Franklin River as it bounded in a freedom it was not destined to have forty years ago. We stood in the heavily filtered light among rainforest trees as rain soaked us with a gentle hand. The world was only the racing water before us and the drops finding sneaky pathways past our collar.

We thought then, we could never experience such completion again. While we are not environmental warriors, we continue to be willing foot soldiers. Giants had stood where we were and refused to bow to one of Australia's most powerful - dare I say thuggish - government instrumentalities and slowly won more than the battle to save the Franklin, but also won hearts and started a worldwide movement that still fights for the planet and the children who might live on it. Here we were, standing beside the Franklin. It could not, would not get any better than that.

I was wrong, because today we spent some time on the Gordon River and among her rainforest. Today we stood beside a Huon Pine which had fallen down in old age, a mere 2,300 years old. Think about that. It was a sapling before Christ was born.

The day started with the exciting drive from Queenstown to Strahan. Much vaunted, it was just a winding road: one that went on a bit. Gordon River Cruises were our hosts on the quiet superbly appointed Spirit of the Wild, a diesel and electric powered catamaran with two main decks and multiple outside view platforms. On our deck, we each had a leather recliner which was tilted at about 60 degrees to the very large windows, which extended from knee to high ceiling. It was a very comfortable ride.

The lighthouse at Hell's Gate

We cruised up Macquarie Harbour, ironically five times the area of Sydney Harbour yet with an opening to the sea which is only 18 metres wide. It was this fact which stopped it becoming a major seaport and eventually led to first the gold and then extensive copper reserves being road transported to Burnie on the north coast. After swinging north around the Fraser Flats - an immense area of sand bar and critically shallow water - we made our way up to, Hell's Gate, that narrow opening I spoke of. As we passed the outer lighthouse, we were told the heart breaking story from 1907 of the Kawatiri, a steamer which had taken people of Strahan for a picnic cruise. It ran aground on the the north spit of the entrance. Only one life boat was launched but it capsized, drowning a steward and a woman and her two young sons. They were the only casualties as the remaining passengers were taken off the Kawatiri the next day. Even worse, the woman was the wife of the lighthouse keeper and the boys were his sons. He stood watching from the lighthouse his wife called his name and begged from the water for help. There was nothing he could do.

We then made quick headway to the south of the harbour and the Gordon River, switching to a whispering electric drive and a slow crawl to prevent wash on the banks. This was low, low impact tourism. It was already impressive but when the dark water narrowed and the bends started coming back on themselves, shivers were starting to run our spines. The rainforest was so close and yet so dense, there was no seeing through it just over it to the taller emergents. Slowing even further, here was a beautiful narrow waterfall, more heard then seen until we were adjacent. A beaten, craggy Huon Pine leaned out to greet us. Stunted and twisted, it was hardly the tall giant of legend but it had only just matured at about 500 years!

The 2,300 year old Huon Pine

We landed at Heritage Landing and did a boardwalk loop which included a talk from one of the ship's crew about the trees which we stood amongst. Laying beside us was a Huon Pine, perhaps a metre in girth, which had fallen over in old age. It was covered in at least 140 different plants who were thriving. A dendrochonologist - a tree ring reader - has aged the the tree at 2,300 years old. The numbers start to warp you after a while.

Beautiful walk, not withstanding the other two hundred people on the walk.

We then took a slow return journey back out of the Gordon while eating a sumptuous lunch of local trout and salmon, plus chicken and salads and some other delicious looking hot dishes which the intricacies of my gut couldn't cope with ... oh and a few beers.

By the time lunch was finished we were at Sarah Island, infamous as a penal colony of great brutality. Operating from 1822 for just 12 years, some of its stories have written themselves into Australian legend. Only Port Arthur exceeds it for the cruelty of its first 8 years and yet, despite that, change took place after one of its notorious escapees was returned to the island and hung. Before the trap opened, he gave an inspired speech about prisoner led reform. It became a rallying point and prisoners and authorities came to terms and gradually established one of Tasmania's most successful ship building industries. Bushranger Matthew Brady was there, escaped to Hobart for four years before being recognised and returned. James Goodwin escaped and negotiated the wilderness and when caught, was pardoned on the condition he survey the areas he came through to establish roads and railways. 

Perhaps Alex Pearce is the best know in wider Australia. He escaped twice with others and on both occasions, cannibalised them to survive.

The last ship built at Sarah Island was stolen by its tradesmen. They dropped of those who wanted to stay further up the harbour and sailed the ship to Chile!

The "New Penitentiary"

Sarah Island is wonderfully well maintained by Tassie national parks. Formed paths cover the island and there are numerous remains of old buildings to visit and study. I was most interested in the most complete of them, the once three story sandstone and brick building called by the prisoners "The New Penitentiary". It was for the most cooperative prisoners and was built after the reforms largely changed the island. It had fireplaces and relatively comfortable bedding. It was so well built it would have been intact today but for a very strange bloke from Queensland. He is believed to have been related to a prisoner who was on Sarah Island. He came here sometime in the 1960's with a quantity of explosives and blew the building up.

Queenslander's eh? 

Click here to see today's photos

We had some high quality guiding on the island from members of the local drama society. Witty, very engaging and inclusive and kept our large group of seventy odd captivated.

The last of the afternoon was in return to Strahan.

What a bloody fabulous day.

THE GORDON

Sliding stealth like on the black water

Treading softly

Disturbing so little 

that shadows become silhouettes 

trees reflect on long years

before the white faces came

to look with avarice and

rape with no remorse

Such was the way on the Gordon

This season in the years of the Huon

So short in time

yet long in consequence

Dark as the deep waters

who run to Macquarie Island

bemused by the violence

and inequality that Sarah hosted.

Today I eat the best trout

and salmon and salads

I sip a Pinot Noir 

pop an olive

I have done nothing but cheer

Brown and his radical crew

for their vision

and sacrifice

For saving this place.