Gems of the World: Port Arthur, Tasmania, Australia

Friday, February 18^th, 2011 67 degrees 7:00 AM – 6:00 PM

Port Arthur Penal Colony

63 miles southeast of Hobart. Coastline spectacular.

When Governor George Arthur, Lieutenant-Governor of Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania) was looking for a site to dump his worst convict offenders in 1830, the Tasman Peninsula was a natural choice. Joined to the rest of Tasmania only by the narrow Eaglehawk Neck, the spit was easy to isolate and guard. Between 1830 and 1877 more than 12,000 convicts served sentences at Port Arthur in Britain’s equivalent of Devil’s Island. Dogs patrolled the narrow causeway, and guards spread rumors that sharks infested the waters. Reminders of those dark days remain in some of the area names—Dauntless Point, Stinking Point, Isle of the Dead.

Port Arthur Historic Site. UNESCO World Heritage Site. This property, formerly the grounds of the Port Arthur Penal Settlement, is now a lovely and quite large historical park. Be prepared to do some walking between widely scattered sites. Begin at the excellent visitors center, which introduces you to the experience by “sentencing, transporting, and assigning” you before you ever set foot in the colony. Most of the original buildings were damaged by bushfires in 1895 and 1897, shortly after the settlement was abandoned, but you can still see the beautiful church, round guardhouse, commandant’s residence, model prison, hospital, and government cottages. Ghost tours leave the visitor center at dusk and last 90 minutes.

The old lunatic asylum is now an excellent museum with a scale model of the Port Arthur settlement, a video history, and a collection of tools, leg irons, and chains. Along with a walking tour of the grounds and entrance to the museum, admission includes a harbor cruise, of which there are eight scheduled daily in summer. There’s a separate twice-daily cruise to and tour of the Isle of the Dead, which sits in the middle of the bay. It’s estimated that 1,769 convicts and 180 others are buried here, mostly in communal pits.