Tassie Tours 6 Day Island Icons Day Tour Bundle - Cradle Mountain, Wineglass Bay, Hobart Highlights, Port Arthur, Bruny Island, Hastings and Tahune

Map

DAY 1: HOBART TO CRADLE MOUNTAIN AND LAUNCESTON

An early one: the tour leaves Hobart at 7am, with your luggage on board, and heads north up the Midlands. The coffee stop is Campbell Town, where convicts finished the brick Red Bridge over the Elizabeth River in 1838. Sheffield has painted its walls with murals of local history since 1986. Then you have around three hours or a little more in Cradle Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park. Fit walkers can try the 6 km circuit of Dove Lake, a glacial lake under the 1,545-metre crags of Cradle Mountain.

Others take shorter lakeside walks and the rainforest tracks of the Enchanted Forest and King Billy Pine walks, past pines that can live more than 1,000 years, watching for wombats. If time allows you also see Waldheim Chalet, a copy of the 1912 home of Gustav Weindorfer, who campaigned for the park. Drop-off is at your Launceston CBD hotel at about 6pm.

Overnight: Launceston (your own hotel; accommodation isn't included)

DAY 2: WINEGLASS BAY, LAUNCESTON TO HOBART

Pick-up is early in Launceston for the drive down to the East Coast, with a chance to buy breakfast, snacks and a packed lunch on the way. Freycinet National Park, named after the French navigator Louis de Freycinet, became one of Tasmania's first two national parks in 1916. Here you choose your day. Keen walkers get up to four hours on their own: over the saddle to Wineglass Bay beach, about 6 km return, or up Mt Amos, a steep, exposed 3.6 km return climb over granite slabs that isn't safe in the wet.

Or join your guide on the moderate 40-minute climb to the Wineglass Bay lookout, then the easy 600-metre circuit around Cape Tourville lighthouse above the open Tasman Sea. When the weather suits there's a swim at Honeymoon Bay, where the orange on the granite boulders is lichen, not rust. At the Freycinet Marine Farm, whose oysters grow in the wetlands of Moulting Lagoon, you can buy oysters, prawns, crayfish and a glass of local wine. The tour then heads south down the coast to finish in Hobart at about 5:45pm.

Overnight: Hobart (your own hotel; accommodation isn't included)

DAY 3: BRUNY ISLAND

Days 3, 5 and 6 can change order. The day starts with a pick-up at about 7:30am and the drive south to Kettering, where a car ferry crosses the D'Entrecasteaux Channel, named after the French admiral Bruni d'Entrecasteaux, who charted it in 1792. The ferry keeps a fixed timetable, so be ready early.

On Bruny Island the morning is the active part: an easy rainforest walk, then coastal tracks to beaches, cliffs and lookouts chosen for the weather, and a lagoon swim when it's warm enough. Your guide knows where the island's white wallabies, a pale form of the Bennett's wallaby, are often seen. Timber steps at The Neck climb to a platform above the sand strip joining North and South Bruny, where little penguins nest in the dunes. Time allowing, you reach Cape Bruny Lighthouse, built by convicts and first lit in 1838.

Lunch is at the Bruny Hotel (own cost), then honey, chocolate and oysters to taste and buy before the ferry back and drop-off in Hobart at about 5:30pm.

Overnight: Hobart (your own hotel; accommodation isn't included)

DAY 4: HOBART, SALAMANCA MARKET AND RICHMOND

A guided loop of Hobart takes in the waterfront, the sandstone warehouses of Salamanca Place and Battery Point, named after the gun battery set up on the point in 1818. Then the road climbs through forest to the 1,272-metre summit of kunanyi (Mt Wellington), where snow can fall in any month and the whole city and the River Derwent lie below. It's a Saturday, so the day starts at about 8am and adds about 75 minutes at Salamanca Market, held every Saturday since 1972, with more than 300 stalls of produce, food, art and crafts.

Out in the Coal River Valley there's a free tasting at Wicked Cheese, then lunch (own cost) in Richmond, whose convict-built bridge of 1823 is the oldest stone bridge still in use in Australia. The day ends at Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary, home of Tasmania's 24-hour wildlife rescue service, with Tasmanian devils, wombats and kangaroos. Drop-off is at about 4pm.

Overnight: Hobart (your own hotel; accommodation isn't included)

DAY 5: PORT ARTHUR AND THE TASMAN PENINSULA

The day leaves Hobart at about 9:30am for the Tasman Peninsula. The first stop is the lookout over Pirates Bay, then the Dog Line at Eaglehawk Neck, where soldiers once chained a row of dogs across a strip of land less than 100 metres wide to stop convicts escaping. After a short stop at the Tasmanian Chocolate Foundry you can spend 30 or 60 minutes at the lavender farm, or skip it. Then comes the Port Arthur Historic Site, a convict settlement from 1830 to 1877 and one of the eleven Australian Convict Sites on the World Heritage list since 2010.

Entry is included, and you choose three or four hours among the ruins, cottages and gardens. The great shell of the Penitentiary began life as a flour mill and granary. In the afternoon the included harbour cruise passes the Isle of the Dead, where around 1,100 convicts, soldiers and free settlers lie buried. Take the three-hour option and you add Remarkable Cave, a tunnel the sea has cut through the cliffs below a lookout over Maingon Bay (a parks pass for it is bought on the day). Heading home, the tour stops at Blue Lagoon Oysters in Dunalley, where an oyster-shucking champion works and you can buy oysters or cold seafood. You're back in Hobart at about 5:30pm.

Overnight: Hobart (your own hotel; accommodation isn't included)

DAY 6: TAHUNE AIRWALK AND HASTINGS CAVES

Pick-up is at about 7:45am for the drive south to Huonville, on the river named after Huon de Kermadec, one of d'Entrecasteaux's captains in 1792. After a takeaway coffee you follow the Huon River through the orchard country that gave Tasmania the name Apple Isle. At Tahune you have about two hours: walk the 600-metre Airwalk 50 metres up in the canopy, take the 3.4 km Swinging Bridges Track over the Huon and Picton rivers, or stay at ground level among Huon pines up to 2,500 years old.

After lunch (own cost) a guide leads you through Hastings Caves, where timber workers found Newdegate Cave in 1917, the largest dolomite cave open to visitors in Australia. Watch for platypus in the reserve's creeks. On the way home there's a cider stop with paddles, cider and desserts to buy, before drop-off in the late afternoon.

Map

• Comfortable closed-toe walking shoes
• Waterproof jacket and warm layers (Cradle Mountain weather turns quickly)
• Sunscreen, hat and sunglasses
• Water bottle
• Swimwear and a towel
• Camera

• Hotel pick-up and drop-off at selected Hobart and Launceston CBD hotels
• One-way transport Hobart to Launceston (day 1) and Launceston to Hobart (day 2)
• Space for standard luggage on the Cradle Mountain day
• National park entry at Cradle Mountain, Freycinet and on Bruny Island
• Return car ferry to Bruny Island
• Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary entry and Wicked Cheese tasting
• Port Arthur Historic Site entry and the optional Isle of the Dead cruise
• Tahune Airwalk entry and a guided Hastings Caves tour
• Local guides and air-conditioned small-group vehicles

Not included

• Accommodation, including your night in Launceston
• Meals, tastings and drinks
• Parks pass for Remarkable Cave, bought on the day ($24.55)
• Lavender Farm, chocolate, seafood, cider and other purchases

Preparing for the trip

Private tours and families

Booking the trip

Who travels with us

Cost and Fees

Whilst on tour