Day 34: Low Head to Grants Lagoon

Looking towards the Tamar River and George Town.

On our way out of town we stopped at a lookout outside George Town. Read some more history and discovered it’s the third oldest town in Australia, after Sydney and Hobart.

We also found more mountain biking stuff today. Many small towns in Tasmania have made tracks and attract cyclists. The most noticeable we drove through today was the small town of Derby: there were many bike and bike trailers. It’s school holidays here, so I’m guessing they had holiday events going on.

St Columbia Falls

We stopped for a comfort stop in Bridport, it's on the north coast and has been a vacation spot for over 100 years (remember: this is a long time in Australia's short history!). Then we had lunch in a Lions park in Scottsdale. Another free camping spot, but this was was very well patronised, probably because of the hot showers that were available for $3. 

After lunch we drove on very windy roads for over an hour, as we headed east to the coast at St Helen’s. I rarely got over 50 km/h.

We stopped for a short walk to St Columbia Falls (so wet and cold!) in Pyengana and then for coffee/chai and scones at an old dairy farm. The dairy farm is fully automated: which, I discovered, means the cows can come at any time (minimum interval six hours) to be milked by the machines! 

Dairy Farm where we stopped for afternoon tea

There's so much history in this one little valley, some of the farms are run by the fourth or fifth generation. At the head of the walk was some of the stories of the ancestors of the current land owners. Including one mother who went looking for a lost cow in winter and got lost herself for over a week. They gave up on her, but she showed up anyway, with frozen toes that needed amputating! Her first words were: let me see my kids! There was another family that had six sons who licenced their farm house in 1880 so they could sell alcohol. It's now called Pub in the Paddock.

About 190 km, took over two
hours, though,
due to very windy roads.

We found some really free, free camping north of St Helen’s at a place called Grants Lagoon. The local council (called "Break O'Day"!) has made a real effort to provide great camping options in this area and further north. There was almost no one there. 

Grants Lagoon

Free camping, We are discovering, often costs money, but not as much as places that provide more facilities. Usually they don’t provide electricity or water or showers. Sometimes there’s a fee, sometimes a donation is requested. Occasionally you can pay for a shower and sometimes there’s toilets. But at this place there was no fee or request for a donation, so for the first time in our trip we stayed in a public place without paying anything! There was a drop toilet that we used during the day (but at night used our own). It was another very quiet night, with no need to use our eye masks!