TasWeekend: Going it alone in the Tasmanian wilderness

HERMITS have found solace in Tasmania’s wilderness for generations, including famous recluses Gustav Weindorfer, Jimmy Possum and Jane Cooper. And there are still people who go into hiding in this day and age, sometimes to find themselves.

Jane Cooper was a hermit who lived on s De Witt’s Island in 1971. She was later known as Flute Cannon.

TASMANIA is an easy place to get lost in, and ­it happens frequently. Even experienced bushwalkers occasionally become disorientated ­or incapacitated while hiking through the state’s remote and ­unforgiving wilderness areas. And when people do go missing, searching for them is equally confounding, with impenetrable vegetation and wildly fluctuating weather conditions.

The flip side of this is that Tasmania is also a great place to hide. It is difficult enough to find someone who wants to be found, so someone who does not want to be found could potentially go unseen for years.

Not everyone who goes missing is lost. Tasmania has a long history of hermits and recluses living in the wilderness, using the rugged landscape to remain hidden and isolated from the rest of the world. People’s reasons for doing this are many and diverse and sometimes completely unknowable, though ­sometimes understandable.

Gustav Weindorfer was an Austrian botanist who famously championed the Cradle Mountain region as a national park and tourism region, building the Waldheim Chalet in 1912 with his wife Kate to allow tourists to stay in the valley.

But after the death of both Kate and his mother in 1916, ­Weindorfer became depressed, and a wave of anti-German ­sentiment brought on by the hostilities of World War I led to him becoming an ­almost total recluse. He started living full-time at the chalet, which was populated by visitors only during the summer months, leaving him alone for the rest of the year, ­during which time he sold timber and furs to help make ends meet, the notoriously rugged track leading to the chalet ­guaranteeing his isolation.

Wilderness lover Gustav Weindorfer and his wife Kate built Waldheim Chalet in 1912 for tourists at Cradle Mountain. But after her death in 1916, he lived as a recluse during the winter months after the tourists had gone.

Legendary historical figure Jimmy Possum reputedly lived in a hollowed-out tree in the bush near Deloraine towards the end of the 19th century, hiding away and making furniture, which he used as his currency. Little else is known about him. No photos exist and there are few records apart from oral legends.

Many of the chairs he made – known as Jimmy Possum chairs – survive and are now collectors’ items, his unique style being copied by modern furniture-makers: the kind of attention that would almost certainly have annoyed the notorious recluse.

In his recent book, The Stranger in the Woods (Simon & ­Schuster, $29.99), Michael Finkel recounts his experiences of interviewing the US’ most famous hermit Christopher Knight who simply walked away from his family in 1986 at the age of 20 and lived, completely hidden, in the forests of Maine for 27 years.

Knight survived the brutal winters and constant threat of starvation by raiding nearby huts and lodges for food, ­clothing and other supplies. His survival skills were legendary. He became so adept at moving unseen, leaving no trail, and at stealthily stealing supplies that his existence took on an ­almost supernatural quality in the minds of residents.

It was only after a ranger installed a hi-tech alarm system at one of Knight’s favourite burglary targets, an often uninhabited holiday camp, the hermit was finally captured.

Knight lived in a large tent in a particularly dense part of the forest, always stayed clean-shaven so as not to arouse suspicion if seen by someone walking by, and had gone so long without conversation he had almost forgotten how to converse. He never gave any clear reason for why he walked into the woods and never returned. “I wasn’t consciously judging ­society or myself,” he told Finkel. “I just chose a different path.”

The desire to be alone is clearly overwhelming for some ­people. Whether because of disillusionment with society, a quest for spiritual enlightenment, or plain old misanthropy, sometimes people just reject the company of others, and ­Tasmania happens to be brimming with places in which to lose yourself – literally.

Arguably Tasmania’s most famous hermit was Melbourne teenager Jane Cooper who, in August 1971, aged just 18, ­marooned herself on the isolated De Witt Island off the south coast of the state. Simply saying she wanted to isolate herself from civilisation, get away from it all and find herself, Cooper travelled to Tasmania with the express intention of stranding herself on this tiny scrub-covered hump of wind and sea-blasted rock. De Witt Island, also known as Big Witch, is only about 6km offshore, but is difficult to reach because of wild seas and its rocky coast.

Cooper paid a fisherman to take her to the island and she struck a deal for fishing boats to bring occasional supplies and collect and deliver letters between her and her family – her only real communication with the outside world. While on the island she fed herself by fishing and diving for lobster, befriended a penguin, calling it Mickey Mouse, and even planted a small ­vegetable patch. She decided she loved the solitude so much she wanted to remain there for the rest of her life.

The Tasmanian Government became uneasy about her ­presence on the island, ostensibly because of its status as a wildlife reserve, and in September 1971 they threatened to have her forcibly removed from the island if she could not be convinced to leave on her own.

This threat led to an outpouring of support for Cooper from the Tasmanian community, notably from the fishermen who worked in the region and took it upon themselves to keep ­a protective eye on her. A month later the government decided she could stay on the island.

In March 1972, after living on the island for eight months, Cooper came in to Hobart for medical and dental appointments, and also appeared in the Magistrates Court, having been charged with marijuana possession and use on the island. She pleaded guilty and a conviction was recorded with ­no further penalty, and by the end of the month she was back on De Witt Island.

De Witt Island, an outcrop 6km off Tasmania’s rugged South Coast was the remote home of Melbourne teenager Jane Cooper. The island, also called Big Witch, is difficult to reach because of its rocky coast and treacherous sea.

But it was the beginning of the end of her time on the island and by the end of 1972 she was living at Seven Mile Beach, later moving to NSW and changing her name to Flute Cannon.

Hobart filmmaker Ella Kennedy told Cooper’s story in a 2002 documentary called De Witt 7001, saying she had a lot ­of admiration for the young woman who seized control of her own life in such a dramatic and transformative way.

“A lot of us sit around and think about doing something like that, but she just said ‘stuff it all’ and did it,” Kennedy says.

While Cooper opted for the Robinson Crusoe method, ­marooning herself on an isolated island, the vast tracts of ­untouched bushland of the Tasmanian mainland provide quite adequate cover for most of our known hermits.

If you need proof of how effective the bush is as a hiding place, you need look no further than kunanyi/Mt Wellington. The mountain rising above Hobart is home to small huts and holiday shanties built on its slopes during the 19th century, when such construction was largely unregulated. Most have vanished over time, but some remain and their exact locations are kept a closely guarded secret – officially, at least. However, their ­locations are known among dedicated bushwalkers, who occasionally visit and sometimes sleep overnight in them. But there is a kind of covenant among hikers to protect the secrecy around the huts.

The fact these structures can exist on the side of a mountain so close to a capital city and still remain virtually undetectable by anyone except those who know exactly where to look, ­is testament to just how easily someone could make a home for themselves in more remote areas in almost complete ­confidence of never being disturbed.

In 1932, a hermit was discovered living in the bush at Tooms Lake, near Swansea on the East Coast. His name does not appear to have been recorded, but a newspaper report from the time states he was 46 years old.

“Till a day or two ago he had never seen a train, a tramcar, the sea, or a boat,” the report read. “Telephones, clocks, ­radiators and gramophones were to him unknown. It is also ­certain that he had never known the blessing of politicians, and no candidate had ever spoken a kind word to him. But he is now a sophisticated person to whom the marvels of city life are no more hidden, for he was brought into Hobart and introduced to everyday marvels – even to the American films – from which it is understood he is slowly recovering.”

Not far away, and much more recently, a hermit was ­discovered living in a secluded part of the Mt Pearson State ­Reserve near Binalong Bay about three years ago.

Ted Bugg has been a Parks and Wildlife ranger for about 25 years, including five years at the Bay of Fires, where he says he regularly encountered people who took advantage of the free camp sites and put down roots for a little bit too long.

“We had a host of residents who would be there for extended periods,” Bugg says. “Our only stipulation was that they move on after 28 days and remove all their rubbish. We had to be quite firm with them because otherwise they started building barbecues and permanent structures and really settling in.”

One of the more recalcitrant regulars was a man who was originally from interstate, and Bugg had been forcing him to move on, over and over again, for the best part of a year ­before he finally disappeared.

“He was a pretty fit bloke, he practised martial arts, so it was with some trepidation that I had to approach him and move him on, but after 12 months we thought we’d finally got rid of him.”

A replica of Waldheim Chalet built by Gustav Weindorfer in 1912. Picture: LIBBY SUTHERLAND

But eventually the would-be hermit was discovered living in a secluded part of the reserve, at the end of a long bush track, for as long as nine months. Bugg was doing some routine ­weeding duties when he stumbled upon the campsite.

“He was living in a fully decked-out motor home, an assortment of other structures had started to appear around it, and there was a variety of plants – both legal and illegal – ­growing in the vicinity,” Bugg says.

“We called the police in and approached the bus.”

After an incident, the camper was arrested and charged and then released, when he returned to his bush camp.

But it was not long before his campervan caught fire and burnt out, the man disappearing in a small car that he had ­previously attached to the back of it.

“We haven’t seen him since. Because the police were watching him, we know he left the state, though,” says Bugg, who says he has found about 20 hermits and squatters during his career, some hidden in state reserves, some on private property. He suspects the practice is widespread, with many more who just haven’t been discovered yet.

“I’ve stumbled across 20 or so just in the North-East, ­so multiply that around the state, and that’s just the ones we know about. They usually have the basics for survival and comfort, a campervan or gazebo with a barbecue, something like that. One time I discovered a guy living in a van with a pot-belly stove ­inside, with a hole cut in the roof for the flue. People do it for a whole variety of reasons – relationship breakdowns, maybe they’re just misanthropes, you name it.”

Some people are genuinely homeless. Others are just trying to find themselves, and getting lost somewhere seems like the best way to do it. Some of the most famous stoics of history have found their enlightenment while hiding in a cave or sitting under a tree for long periods of time, away from other humans. So why not?

When Michael Finkel asked Christopher Knight if he had spent any time pondering life’s great questions during his 27 years alone in the Maine forests, he had this to say:

“I lost my identity. With no audience, no one to perform for, I was just there. There was no need to define myself. I became ­irrelevant. The moon was the minute hand, the seasons the hour hand. I didn’t even have a name. I never felt lonely. To put ­it romantically, I was completely free.”