Bruny Island Berry Farm

A flashback from Tasmania last March when we were on Bruny Island.  There’s a map in this post that shows where we were.

There are a few berry picking farms in Tasmania, enough that there’s even a lovely tourist brochure highlighting them all for you. We decided to save our berry picking adventures for Bruny Island where we visited…are you ready?…the aptly named Bruny Island Berry Farm. 

This could possibly be the best berry farm location ever.  Right across from the water!

Unfortunately by waiting this long into our trip to Tasmania we pretty much missed berry picking season.  They told us to have a wander through anyway, and if the kids found a few strawberries they could feel free to pick them.  TurboBug was way more interested in the little owl bobble-head statues.  He kept pointing out their ears, eyes, and noses.  I was afraid he’d accidentally take the head off one of them!  [He would have been about 20 months old here.  So that means four months later we were on the Sunshine Coast in QLD, since that’s where we celebrated his birthday!]

We did find a few berries here and there, they grow many different kinds on the farm.  I think this is a blueberry, at least it looks like one that isn’t quite the right colour yet.

We wondered about the tazziberries but didn’t get to try any.  Do they only grow in Tasmania?

We did pick a couple of strawberries each.  I think SkeeterBug (10) found the only large one they had left!

After our berry picking adventure we sampled the lovely ice cream.

Don’t worry, the youngest was not forgotten.

He even held it up for a picture.

They had one of those tennis games set up, we have one of these packed away at home so the kids were happy to see it.  I convinced JitterBug (7) to let his little brother have a turn with him for a little while.  He obliged and TurboBug lost interest before long and JitterBug had it all to himself. 

Because there was an awesome old truck to play with.  What else could a toddler need?

I walked down to have a little wander on the beach.  The weather was getting cooler by then, beach season in Tassie was pretty much over by March, or at least it was this far south.  If I’m remembering correctly, that’s Penguin Island in the distance which we saw more closely when we did the walk to Grass Point.

Lovely, lovely Tasmania, how lucky we are to have visited you!

Bruny Island: The Neck

The north and south ends of Bruny Island come together in a spectacular isthmus.  A rather large set of steps awaits any who want to climb up and see the stunning view.

We counted on the way back down and there were over two hundred steps. 

Look how narrow this strip of land is.  Ocean on one side…

And ocean on the other.  It really feels like a unique spot.

There’s a memorial to Truganini, and a nearby sign that tells her story.  She was a Tasmanian Aborigine.  Her story is so sad that I can’t bear to think about it.

The view from the top is stunning.  We’re wearing hats because it was so. incredibly. windy.

Funny faces.  TurboBug, you’re really going to have to learn this.  We can’t have you smiling so cutely while we all make horrendous faces.

Absolutely breathtaking views.  Wait up, TurboBug!  That’s a lot of steps to conquer on your own.

Look at the difference in the colour of the water on either side.  We passed by here during low tide and the stretch of water on the right side was more like a series of sand and puddles.

The ocean takes on such beautiful colours.  I love seeing how different it can look.

Part way down we realised TurboBug’s hat had flown away.  We (meaning Dad) had to jump the fence to retrieve it.

Breathtaking.  Did I say that already?

We’d heard that this was a great point for spotting penguins, so our first night we came up for a look.  We weren’t the only ones!  They’ve erected this platform so that you won’t disturb the penguins or other shorebirds in the area, since they nest in the bush.  At the bottom there is a gate that you can use to access the beach during the day.  We covered our torches with red so as not to hurt their eyes.  We only managed to spot a handful of them.  It’s a fun thing to do, even if we did get rained on a bit!

We did see a set of these…young siblings waiting for mum to come back with some food!

 

Since there hadn’t been many penguins we didn’t try again the next night.  We had seen some in Bicheno, and it probably won’t be our last time during our trip around Australia that we’ll have the opportunity to go penguin watching.  Hopefully we’ll fare better next time!

Captain Cook Monuments

All over Australia we are seeing references to Captain Cook.  He’s pretty important in Australia’s history in terms of discovery, being an explorer and all.  ;) Growing up I was always told that he is an ancestor of my father’s family, so the name always catches my eye.  There were a couple of monuments on Bruny Island with his name, so we stopped for a look.     

This one made us laugh because it just seemed so odd.  Just a tall tower of bricks.  The bench next to it was very nice, however!

Another one further down the road attempts to make clear who was there first!

I’m sure we will be seeing more Captain Cook monuments in our future!

The Walk To Grass Point

We knew we’d only have a couple of nights on Bruny Island, so after we set up camp we drove down to Adventure Bay to do the walk to Grass Point.  The kids were not too thrilled to be taking off so soon after we got there, they wanted the chance to explore the campsite.  The Grass Point walk is part of the Fluted Cape Walk in South Bruny National Park, which is one of the 60 Great Short Walks in Tasmania.  It’s supposed to be about an hour and a half return, but these things always take us longer! 

The trail starts on the beach, so we were again treated to the beautiful views Tasmania has to offer.

The trail quickly left the beach.  We were happy to find another pant-a-log.  Jitterbug is laughing because it isn’t clothed.  Boys.

Along the way we came upon not just a fairy house, but a whole fairy city!  Someone had worked hard on these.  There were piles of rocks all over the place.

They were fun to look at and the kids enjoyed adding their own piles of rocks to the city.

So much whaling happened in this area.  If they’d only known what they were doing to the whale population. 

Someone from WA must have been missing home.  (That’s Western Australia, not Washington!)

Some beautiful scenery at the end of the trail.

This is Penguin Island.  We might have been able to make it across to it but we didn’t try.  We would have been quite wet!  We were content to clamber around on the rocks where we were.

The kids decided to scare me by climbing the nearby cliffs.  I stopped taking pictures so I wouldn’t have to look!

Somebody was sleepy!  Thank goodness for our Ergo.

There is actually some grass at Grass Point!

The return walk always seems to take longer with kids.  I think because they are complaining more.  It’s not new scenery since we’d already walked that way, and we’ve already seen what there is to see.  They suddenly realise they are tired and bored and hungry.  Every time!  But there are still pretty things to see…even tree bark can be beautiful!

I think these shorebirds are pied oystercatchers.  They were so cute, happily chatting to each other as they made their way up the beach.  They were careful not to come to close to us.

This picture appears earlier in this post, but I love it in black and white.

More Bruny Island on the way!