A break for a week by a lake

Two years on from our extended-family holiday at Swansea, The four of us and Imp, Ed, Karri and Miah did it again, this time a week at Sisters Beach on the NW coast. Our house was actually at Lake Llewellyn 2km back from Sisters, but very handy to that beach and to Boat Harbour as well – Australia’s Most Beautiful Drive-Up Beach (Wineglass Bay probably has the overall top spot sewn up but you need to walk or sail there).

This was an important family get-together as Marcus’ departure for Hong Kong gets closer, currently booked for March 10. The cousins all get on well, and they spent the week sharing a small bunk room. For various reasons we had four cars between the eight of us, so that meant we could go in a few different directions at once although we did spend most of the week all together. The house is called Platypus Chalet, it’s on Airbnb and we recommend it.

Disclaimer: we understand short term rental operations play a part in the Tasmanian housing crisis. Our host only has one house not ten, and it's a purpose-built holiday house, so I feel like it's kosher.

Our place was one of about 25 at the lake, I think the only one without water frontage. A neighbour suggested to us a good way to get down to the water (but that information is classified). The lake was man-made in the 60s or 70s, it seems mostly for watersports enthusiasts. We swam in it and paddled our wave ski on it every day. One day Elf was paddling while Imp swam alongside and they encountered two platypus! Imp was a bit concerned about the famous poison spur but everyone kept their distance and played nice. I was on the bank as they came back in. Imp had run out of swimming energy so she had hung from the back of the wave ski for a while. Then Elf got a bad cramp so Imp propelled them back to shore. What a pair.

A paddle around Lake Llewellyn

The high side of the lake bank (3rd pic above) looks at first glance like impenetrable virgin bush, but the road to Sisters Beach is right there. So occasionally the Castaway vibe is shattered by very mundane vehicles cruising through on the sealed road. This road has no footpath, and a 100kmh speed limit, but there are ‘Shared Road’ in a few places. If I was in charge of a road and I wanted drivers to share it with pedestrians and horse riders I'd probably make it 60, not 100. Imp and Ed have been here before and walked down this road, so they were happy to do so again. But it scares the pants off me as a pedestrian. One day the rest of us drove to Boat Harbour and Imp and Ed walked this road to Sisters Beach then walked along the coast to meet us. They are quite outward bound compared to us.

Mum and Dad used to own a block on the beachfront at Sisters, with plans to build on it. It was a very fast growing area in the early 00s and then there was a moratorium on new building for a while – they ended up selling the block and moving east to Turners Beach, and then later to Hobart. The house that has been built on the old block is … disappointing.

Around the Sisters Beach township. Middle pic is an amazing place next to Mum & Dad's old block built by a boatbuilder. The pic above is just a classic old shack, before people started proper real solid houses here.

We had a day trip to Stanley to climb The Nut. In a shed at the top there was an interpretative panel with various loose theories about how The Nut got its name. Then it mentions in passing that the palawa name for it is moo-nut-re-ker which seems to me like probably the source. I had never heard this name before. 

The amazing views from The Nut. 

Michael's 19th birthday fell on day 3 of 7, so we took his gifts up with us. We gave him a fairly good metal detector; more news on that once he has taken it for a spin. We had lunch for his birthday in Wynyard at The Vault, a great spot overlooking the river operating in an old bank.

We had heaps of trips to the various beaches. We flopped about the house and did a lot of reading. We got in and out of the lake and the spa tub. We watched old movies and TV shows in the extensive DVD collection. The kids had a Friday night out in Wynyard which was uneventful. I had a day prowling around my old home town of Burnie, and a walk on my own down to Boat Harbour, but I'll do seperate posts for those.

Above is Sisters Beach. A lovely place to swim, I had forgotten the water was so clear.
It’s surrounded by Rocky Cape National Park.
The pics below are Boat Harbour. It was a very calm day so Elf joined us.
I had not forgotten the clear water here; the sand is pure white and
it's just a joy to behold. There were white fish swimming around in the shallows.

At Ed's suggestion we also did a trip to Dip Falls, a spectacular spot 40 mins south of Stanley. It's the middle of nowhere but we all enjoyed it.

The four kids spent most of their time together and had a ball. [As I write a couple of weeks later write the same crew have just come back from a 5 hour walk on Mt Wellington]. They shared a bunk room and they were in the hot tub together every day. They decided to have a night out in Wynyard on our last night at the house. They rang to be picked up fairly early; as there was not all that much happening and they themselves were the main attraction in town.

On our last day we did a big clean up then set off in dribs and drabs in the four cars. The kids had two cars but wanted to travel down all together to enjoy the Hottest 100 on the radio, which is cute. So I took our car and Elf drove Marcus's. She was keen to just get home while I had some diversions planned.

I had another swim at Burnie; this time the beach was pretty grotty, as it as was the day after Australia Day. I did a walk around the CBD and pondered what used to be in various locations back in 1982 or whatever. The closeness of the beach to the town centre is something I mention every time Burnie comes up - but there can't be many places where you could buy a boogie board at K-mart then walk two blocks to the surf club and paddle out.

It was a beaut day for driving. After the swim and walk I drove to Launceston and caught up with Joe who is just back from a soccer camp with William in the UK, which was a big success. William is on course to be soccer professional. 

Lovely old deco Gospel Hall in Launceston next to Du Cane Brewery

Then I went across town and saw Lynn and Scott and heard all their news - they are both teaching at country schools now - Lynn is principal at Westbury and Scott is at Hagley.

Then the drive home from Launceston was mostly uneventful.

Montagu Bay Primary, another school with an amazing view

Today was Elf's last day on the holiday. She is now secretary of the local community group, she had to write up the minutes of the last meeting, so I took her hint and removed myself and the boys for a few hours.

Our favourite place to swim at is over the river at Clarence Pool, where on Sundays they sometimes have a big inflatable adventure gym thing. You have to climb over it to the end and try not to fall in the water. I let the boys do that while I struggled up and down and logged 350m in the end.

I wanted to stay out for a bit so I took the boys down to Montagu Bay Primary School for a look around. This is the view looking across their oval.

The Tasman Bridge essentially forms one boundary of it. Which is amazing, it must be really something during morning rush hour. But the view beyond the bridge is quite lovely, and there are water views in other directions too as the school occupies a point sticking out into the river. In fact it was just off this point that the Lake Illawarra sank after hitting the bridge in 1974.

We walked around the field and found a gate through to under the bridge, where Michael annoyed the fishermen by experimenting with the acoustics.

After that I took them up to Rosny Hill lookout where we could see the same setup from on high. That's Montagu Bay in the foreground with a few boats - I think I will set off for my next paddle from there.

Here is another view of the primary school and the bridge - I captured this in 2007 from the webcam at Rose Bay High School over the other side of the highway. The sun seems to be setting in a strange direction.

Marcus: upgraded from Jellyfish to Seashell

Marcus was moved into a more advanced swimming class yesterday. He was initially assessed as being of Jellyfish standard. This is based on a short in-pool interview, child being asked to do this and that. He has found the classes very basic and was thrilled to be reclassified from invertebrate blob to attractive collectable mollusc.

Mr Sunshine

Hello all, I'm feeling bright, perky and gald to be alive! That's better isn't it? Thanks to everyone who gave me a slap around the head and cheered me up.

We finally had a weekend of fair to good weather, so we went to the beach three times. Nick and Anna, Lily and Katherine came by on Saturday morning and we took them for a walk down to Boronia Beach. Well, we drove to the top of the track, then we walked. Everyone agreed it's a beaut little beach, not least because there are shady trees along the back of it.

Later Marcus and I went for a long walk down to the main beach, right along to the rocks at the Browns River end, and home again. Elf and Michael came down to find us when Michael woke up from his nap. Elf was so confident she would find us she didnt take her house keys. They did not find us, Michael refused to walk, they struggled home and amused themselves in the backyard until Marcus and I returned. We took an extra long time as we had found some excellent rock pools and couldn't tear ourselves away from the crabs, seastars, anemones and sea snails. Also we had a swim, and Marcus's first encounter with reasonable size waves at a reasonable depth went very well. He was very brave (for him). I have 99% convinced him to have swimming lessons.

On Sunday we had a party in the Botanical Gardens for Marcus's mate Ruben (no E). That went off very well. Ruben is a big fan of the Cactus House, so that's where they had his party. Marcus is a big fan of the Antarctic House (actually sub-antarctic, as the mural painted around the wall includes a rabbit). It was realistically cold and windy in there.

In the afternoon we drove to the rock-pooly end of the beach (everyone was very tired) and showed our rockpools off to Elf and Michael. Marcus ran up and down the beach like a loon and had to swim again. I was feeling poorly and couldn't bring myself to. Whatever the weather, any way you slice it, the water here is very cold.

Fraught at the Big Pool

Elf volunteered me to take Marcus and Lana-from-next-door to the pool. They get on well so I was happy to give it a go. I was looking forward to having two kids with the same swimming ability - with Michael and Marcus I have to sit in the baby pool with Michael, trying to keep an eye on Marcus while he zooms around through the crowd.

I was only slightly apprehensive about the change rooms situation. My friend Rob takes his daughter into the blokes changing room, for now. I didn't really want to take Lana in, especially as with Marcus too it wouldn't necessarily be a straightforward in/change/out. Taking friends' kids to the pool is quite fraught, unless you are able to pick them up and deliver them back in some kind of supersize, extra-thirsty towel that doesn't get the car seat all wet. It's the undressing and dressing that makes me nervous in this day and age.

At the Big Pool there is a door marked Family Changeroom, which I always thought must lead to a corridor with a number of family changerooms. Surely there would be too much demand for them to have just one? Well, we had a pretty good time in the water, and when we got out found there there is only one family changeroom, and it was free. We had several knocks on the door while we were in there, so it seems to be in high demand. We managed the whole process without me having a panic attack or breaking any laws - although I am not an expert in this field.