DFR Travels: Port Arthur, Tasmania...

Sunday, February 12. Some cloud, then wind and light rain.16 C. Iffy but OK.

Tasmania. One of the greatest Penal Colonies in Australia,. Tasmania is not a country as some people think, but a State in ‘Australia’. We Four had managed to scrape up a short Walking Tour at 11:00 AM today. We usually try for an earlier start but that was all we could get. Jim decided to go ashore on one of the first tenders to get a head start to the day, we were unaware of that but also had decided to go early and wander about to see how much things may have changed since our last visit. [It is difficult to put a date on previous visited places, but it was maybe 10 years ago, on a land trip.] We Four met up by chance wandering about the estate-like grounds that were once this Penal Colony.

We met up with our Tour Leader, right on time at 11:15. The weather was windy and spitting rain by then so Gail returned on a tender and went back to the ship. The Walking Tour was led by a woman, stout in build and lasted about 1 1/2 hour. She had a great, great great Grandfather who was in the penal colony as an inmate and was also part Aboriginal as well. Interesting person and tour. She told many stories, some no doubt enhanced, but it made the tour mean so much more than just looking at things and trying to imagine what they were and what happened there.

The Colony eventually shut down because as the situation changed, Transportation as punishment declined and eventually ceased, therefore causing a shortage of the convict labour required to maintain the place. It suffered from fires and eventually neglect. It is now just a tourist attraction. A point of interest is that there was a tragic mass shooting on the grounds some time a few decades ago that resulted in the Australian ban on assault rifles. Gun Control is now firmly under control here.

We returned to the ship at the end of the tour, Jim carried on to a harbour Tour for some time. The ship sailed around 4:00 to Hobart, several miles away and docked for the night.

A Good Day...

A log shot of some of the major prison facilities; all built by convict labour.

A Convict Church. Note Fellette and Jim in their tiny booths. The convict were loaded in, one by one by jailers, masked I believe, so they would not be seen, then a door was closed and other prisoner loaded in beside them. Prisoners could actually see no one and the only person who could see them was the preacher and soldiers up front.