Today is forecast to be the nicest day of the few we are here for so we decided to do a couple of walks around the area. The first one was a circuit round the Tourville lighthouse. Luckily you can drive pretty much to the top then there is a gentle walk around the base of the lighthouse. Unfortunately you can’t go in but the views from the base of it are spectacular. Whales pass by here on the way to the antarctic for the summer but unfortunately we have missed them, it is also only 1,000 km east to the central western coast of New Zealand which is probably where we were this time two years ago! There is a sea mist this morning that the cloud doesn’t seem to be burning off but the view was still really good. As we walked back to the car we were greeted by a wallaby who was just sitting in the car park minding his own business, he is obviously used to humans as he didn’t even move when another car pulled in! He got out of the way so we could drive off and we went round to the Wineglass bay carpark. We hadn’t decided which of the walks we wanted to do but as they both start off in the same way we just set off with a view of making a decision on the way. In the end we went to the Wineglass bay lookout as you have to pretty much climb to the top of the lookout before you can join any of the other paths. It was hard work but the track was good – no scrambling up waterfalls, and the view from the top was worth the effort. Wineglass bay is a beautiful golden sandy beach at the narrowest part of the peninsula and from the lookout you can just see Hazards beech, we decided not to walk to this as it is 11km and it is actually quite hot today, plus I am not as fit as I was when we came out here so instead after sitting looking at the view for a while we headed back down. On the way there was another walk we could have done but this one said you had to allow 5 hours and had a picture of someone basically rock climbing with a note that you ‘may need to scramble over some rock faces’ so we decided this wasn’t for us, instead we drove round to honeymoon beach which isn’t the nicest beech we have seen but is only about 50 yards from the carpark and the water is really clear but also gets deep very quickly so the best way to get in the water is to jump as it appears to be freezing – needless to say we didn’t go in! After this we headed round to the ‘town’ and drove along the esplanade, the whole town seems to be about tourism as there is virtually nothing in town but there is a great view of the hazards – four mountains that you can see from the town of Coles Bay, there was also a great ice cream shop so we stopped for one of those as well by way of a reward for making it up the climb. After this we went back to the room for a well earned relax before heading out for dinner this evening.
