Tasmania has secrets that shouldn’t be buried, we explore some in The Lost Ones Podcast

It’s time for Tasmania’s secrets and skeletons to come out of the closet. It’s why I created the The Lost Ones podcast, to shine a light on cold cases that should be solved, writes Amber Wilson.

Tasmania was a strange place to grow up in.

Cut off from the rest of the world and sitting on the edge of the planet, the island was isolated, sparsely-populated and generally forgotten.

Said to have something of a hangover from its penal colony era, Tasmania’s culture, system and structures seemed to operate independently from whatever was happening across the Bass Strait.

But it was – and is – beautiful.

For a long time, Tasmania’s pristine environments and ecologies have avoided the ravages of development, tourism and pollution.

While all that is now changing, as images of Tasmania grace tourism brochures far-and-wide, the island’s current popularity is new and strange territory for long-term locals.

Wide-eyed at the hype, proud of their island’s beauty but also cautious of what all the influx of tourists and strangers could mean, Tasmanians are adjusting to the challenges of a new era.

Journalist Amber Wilson has create The Lost Ones podcast. Picture: Chris Kidd

Some of those challenges are undesirable – like the cigarette butts left behind at some of our most majestic natural attractions, or the very real possibility that we could “kill the golden goose” with all the extra infrastructure, handrails, car parks, cement and steel needed to access these once pristine sites.

But one of the benefits of Tasmania opening up to the world is the chance to reveal secrets that should never have been buried.

I’m a Tasmanian person, born-and-bred, but have lived much of my adult life interstate and overseas.

Returning home and taking up a job with the newspaper that had been delivered to my family home since I was a kid, I noticed early on that things were done differently in Tasmania to just about any other place I’d been.

And sometimes, that meant things that shouldn’t happen – did happen or were covered up.

While researching and interviewing for The Lost Ones, it was a theme I encountered time and time again – that Tasmania preferred to leave its stones unturned.

These stories explored mysteries that should be revealed and cold cases that should be solved.

Tasmania, whether it likes it or not, is undergoing a period of dramatic change.

And it will be a lot harder to keep its skeletons in the closet.

Listen to episode 1 of The Lost Ones below, and look out for more at www.lostonespodcast.com.au:

Originally published as Tasmania has secrets that shouldn’t be buried, we explore some in The Lost Ones Podcast