Stranded In Strahan

Having spent a terrible night at the Discovery Parks, Cradle Mountain, when my alarm finally went off this morning I really was not prepared to face the day. When I saw the weather, I was less inclined. It was pinging it down with rain.

I got up though, had my breakfast and made my way back to the visitor centre. The mist though was very heavy and it was still raining a bit. After talking to the woman there I decided that it really wasn’t worth it to pay another $16.50 to go down to Dove Lake, spend 2 hours walking in the rain, and then have to hoof it over to Strahan, so I decided to just make my way west.

The weather was absolutely diabolical the whole way, and I really didn’t get to see anything at all. It was terrible. I was apparently driving on one of the most beautiful roads in Tasmania, and I couldn’t appreciate it because I could barely see a few feet in front of my face on account of the fog. Terrible.

So as a result I didn’t really deviate much from the plan, only stopping off to have a little look at Mackintosh Dam, which really wasn’t anything. I then decided it was more important to get to Strahan, on the off chance that there might be an afternoon cruise running or something. So I was quite pleased when I arrived around 12noon.

But then I discovered that the cruises which go up the Gordon river and to Sarah Island leave each day at 8.30am and return at 2.45pm – and that’s basically it. So no chance of a cruise today, unless I wanted to spend an exorbitant amount of money on one to Bonnet island to see the penguins or something. I found out that there were only 2 companies offering cruises of the Gordon river, and one of those (World Heritage Cruises) was running its last one of the season today – and was currently out on the water – so that company was a write off. I went to the other one, Gordon River Cruises, where the woman there informed me that they were still running cruises, but unfortunately they had a computer chip malfunction and it was doubtful it would be fixed by tomorrow! Hm. Not the outcome I was looking for.

The seaplanes aren’t running. The helicopters aren’t running. There’s no chance of any cruise. What does one actually do then in Strahan?

Fortunately I discovered that the jetboat was running. It’s a bit of a tour, (if one can actually have a “tour” on a jetboat, amidst the spins and tail flare outs that jetboats are wont to do), up the King River. Ok, its not the Gordon, but its better than nothing – and it is my only option if I want to do anything in Strahan. So I booked it – but as it didn’t start til 3.00pm, I had to entertain myself until then (some 2 ½ hrs!). But no cafes or restaurants are open; and there’s precious little to do other than a bit of a walk about the town. So off I went, wandering about the town, and then I made my way out to the People’s Park, where there was a nice little walk out to Hogarth Falls. These falls were quite pretty.

By the time I got back into town some of the shops and cafes had started to open up, so I had a very yummy seafood chowder in a sourdough bread bowl for lunch, and then moseyed on back to the Gordon River cruise woman to see if there had been any further developments. There had – she informed me that they definitely were NOT running tomorrow. Crap. So I went and paid for the jetboat, and then made my way to the dock.

The jetboat “tour” actually was fantastic, I really enjoyed myself and got to see quite a lot, considering. The Macquarie harbour is, if I remember correctly, the largest in Australia and it is really very pretty. The King river is quite interesting if only for the fact that nothing lives in it – this is because of the railway which was built between Queenstown and Strahan, which goes alongside the banks of the river. Apparently copper seeps into the river somehow from this railway (which was used to transport a lot of the copper from the mines and so on) and as a result, nothing lives in the river. They’re trying to clean it up but it will take some time.

We went up as far as the Teepookana Bridge which is part of the old railway line between Strahan and Queenstown. En route we happened across the steam train travelling back to Strahan – it was an impressive sight. We came across Huon pines that were 800 years old, and saw some very beautiful scenery – but it was such a shame that, despite having seriously ‘rugged up’, it was still so very cold on the back of that jetboat!

When we got back I decided to thaw out by journeying over to Ocean Beach, a beautiful stretch of beach a few kilometres from Strahan. I could have stayed there for sunset but I decided to try my luck once more with the Gordon River cruise people. You never know, there might have been a change… but alas there wasn’t. So I went back to the World Heritage Cruise company to see if by some miracle they had decided to run one more day in light of the fact that no other cruise was running. Alas, no, there had been no change – but the woman there suggested that I go back to GRC and ask if they were taking their small boat, Sophia, out. She said it seats 12 and that they might be tempted to send it out if there were no other cruises operating.

So back I went. Literally the woman rolled her eyes when I walked through the door again. She was actually quite rude. Anyway, I asked about the Sophia, and then she informs me that it is running 2 cruises tomorrow, one at 8.30 but only to Hell’s Gates, and the other at 11.30 out to Sarah Island. So neither cruise is taking in the Gordon river, but no matter, I was interested. So I enquired about the price, and she was extremely vague. She said, at first, that it all depended on how many people were going – on the first they already had 7, and on the second they had 4. But she didn’t volunteer a price, and I had to keep digging. You could tell she was getting more fed up with me, but I didn’t care – if the price was reasonable I would do it. So she got her colleague involved in the discussion, who said that I would have to split the boat hire cost with the others on the cruise, and that it was about $550. Fine, $550 split between 5 of us would work out at slightly cheaper than the original cruise price. Let’s do it!

Unfortunately that wasn’t the case at all. No, it wasn’t a case of splitting the tour price between all the people on the trip – no, it was a case of splitting the tour price between all the ‘parties’ of the trip – so I would have to pay $275! How illogical is that? Wouldn’t you think you would just split it between all the people, rather than their group?

Suffice to say for $275 I was not going to get a cruise that only took in half of what I wanted anyway. So I left – but then I got a bit miffed. That woman knew how desperate I was to do a cruise, and never once suggested to me the option of the Sophia. Now I know I didn’t take it after all, but how dare she assume just because I’m on my own and I look a bit scruffy (I was in hiking kit after all) that she shouldn’t even give me the option? How rude!

So meanwhile, the sun has now set, and I have no real reason to be in Strahan any longer – but its too late to go anywhere else. I’ll have to try and sort out some accommodation…