Tasmanians to cash in on locals only special deal for Maria Island Walk
For a short time only a multi award-winning tourist attraction is offering Tasmanians a special travel offer with an outdoor guide and someone to cook all your meals. HOW TO BOOK >>
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THERE is a gruelling section of the steep climb up Mt Maria, the highest peak on the East Coast’s Maria Island, where it’s more of a scurry on all fours than a bushwalk.
With arms and legs akimbo I pull myself up and over enormous granite boulders, some the size of a small car, in a push to get to the summit.
Past the boulder scree there are a few tight vertical squeezes and much backpack scraping between overhanging cliffs before the final heave up to the top.
It’s tough going on the quads and for those of us with zero upper-body strength but absolutely worth it.
The outlook from the 711m-high peak is incredible.
The view is blinkered towards the island’s isthmus where north Maria meets south Maria at the Whitsunday-esque Shoal Bay on the Mercury Passage side.
From up there the island’s dramatic coastline is exposed and everything from the historic ruins of the convict-era settlement of Darlington to the wharf where the Triabunna-bound ferry docks and the Painted Cliffs can be captured in a glance.
I’m on the Maria Island Walk’s three-day Tasmanian guided experience and as I perch on rocks to tuck into my gourmet lunch, packed for me earlier that morning, my guide shares some of the eventful history of the place.
I learn that the predominantly granite island has been home to the Tyreddeme people, a first then second wave of convicts and in the 1800s to the Italian entrepreneur Diego Bernacchi and his labour force.
Now, aside from the rangers, abundant animal population and holiday-makers, the island is uninhabited.
Declared in 1971 as a national park, Maria Island is a Noah’s Ark of endemic Tasmanian animals.
The latest refugees are the Tassie devils, who were brought over last decade as an insurance population against the ravages of the devil facial tumour.
The island is also home to free-ranging Cape Barren geese, Forester kangaroos and a special subpopulation of wombats.
Sadly, the intention to rehome thylacines on the island wasn’t realised before the tigers’ extinction in 1936.
Maria boasts a host of ruins as well as built history still standing – and the guides know lots about both.
Among other things, we learn that when Tasmania’s penal era ended Darlington transformed from being a convict settlement, with numerous families and workers drawn to the island to become part of Bernacchi’s industrious vision.
While many buildings are intact, others require more imagination to envisage how they must have looked.
Back at sea level after our mountaintop expedition, our group of four walkers and a guide stride back to historic Bernacchi house, a beautifully restored National Trust-listed cottage overlooking Mercury Passage.
I have admired the beautiful Victorian weatherboard residence in the Darlington settlement on previous trips but never ventured past the private property sign to peer through the windows. This time I’m a guest in the cottage.
I rest my daypack, on loan from my Maria Island Walk hosts, in the same living room where the charismatic Bernacchi entertained Tasmanian premiers and financiers in the 1880s, selling them his dream of producing first wine, then silk and later cement at this picturesque place.
By the second day of my three-day, two-night guided walk our group of eight, all Tasmanians, is piecing together quite an insider’s view of the almost vehicle-free and wombat-laden paradise.
So far today, we’ve explored the quarry where the sandstone for the iconic Commissariat Store was carved out by convicts and been regaled with the exploits of Bernacchi from the very dining room he once sat in.
Though I’ve visited the island before, I’m learning about aspects of the former penal settlement’s history and geography from our guides that I haven’t found elsewhere.
On our last morning half of our tour group decide to scale the 620m Bishop and Clerk with our guide.
After a brekkie of baked eggs with spicy tomatoes and fruit salad we head off about 7.30am into a landscape shrouded in ethereal fog.
At Skipping Ridge, on the eastern side of the island, the open grassland drops away to dramatic cliffs that plunge into the Tasman Sea. Our guide leads us through dry sclerophyll forest, a cloud forest and, at the peak, alpine terrain.
Three-quarters of the way up I begin to regret the beautifully prepared three-course dinner of roast pork with gravy potatoes and rich chocolate cake that I tucked into so heartily the night before.
But I make it to the top with companions who are much more able than me. We imagine the view that is shielded by thick fog.
Far from disappointed, we’re chuffed to have climbed two mountains in two days.
The Maria Island Walk company is currently offering two experiences, with the one I joined tailored for Tasmanians and available until the end of November.
Guests spend both nights in the comfort of Bernacchi House and can choose to do as much or little as they like while still enjoying the fully catered and guided experience.
Local wines and beverages flow and each afternoon is greeted with a tasting plate of gourmet goodies celebrating the state’s producers.
While I choose to scale peaks, some of the others are more leisurely, choosing to stay closer to sea level.
There are plenty of good books to read in the sunshine on the veranda.
The classic Maria Island Walk experience involves more moving. Over three nights, guests dropped by chartered boat at the southern end of the island hike with two guides to two purpose-built standing camps, finishing on the last night at Bernacchi House.
I’ve stayed with my family in the affordable bunkrooms at the Penitentiary before, but to have a hot shower a few steps from a comfy bed at Bernacchi Lodge and not have to trek across a field to a toilet block with a ziplock bag of coins is a luxury.
Picture: Australian Wildlife Collection
The writer travelled as a guest of the Maria Island Walk.
ABOUT THE WALK
The Maria Island Walk Tasmanian Experience trip meets at Triabunna wharf on Day 1 and returns before 5pm on Day 3.
Lightweight backpacks, rain jackets and head torches are provided and the trip is fully catered.
MORE INFO
The three-day Tasmanian Experience for locals runs until the end of November. Cost $999 per person with limited availability left.
The four-day walk that operates from October to April is $2550 per person for departures from 1st October to 25th December 2020, and $2600 per person for departures from 26th December 2020 to 30th April 2021. This walk includes two nights at wilderness camps and a third night at Bernacchi house. Each walk is limited to a maximum of 10 guests accompanied by two guides.
BOOKINGS
For more information visit www.mariaislandwalk.com.au or call 03 6234 2999.
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