When our matronly old Ford Festiva hobbles down the back roads, my door creaks and Hadyn’s fishing pole pokes me in protest. Our trunk is packed with sleeping bags and cooking equipment. Everything smells of bananas, which I have insisted on bringing along for camping breakfasts. This is our time off from work, a weekend on Bruny Island.
And though it’s a rarity to have two days of free time, when you accept seasonal employment on a working holiday visa, it’s important not to lose focus on the “holiday” part of your experience abroad.
Though we arrive on the last weekend of Australia’s school holidays, Bruny looks – and feels – more like our own remote island than a haunt for Hobart’s families.
Hadyn patiently waits for a bite at the Alonnah town jetty.
Bruny Island Cheese Company, part of the region’s “Made on Bruny Island” food trail, turns old-fashioned cheese-making methods into a modern art.
The Cape Bruny Lighthouse, second oldest in Australia, was replaced by solar-powered automatic lights in 1996. “It’s historic,” I tell Hadyn. “When you say ‘lighthouse’, I assume it is…”
On some silent signal, Cape Jetty Beach suddenly floods with crabs. We cannot walk without frightening the miniature crustaceans.
The Neck, an isthmus of beach separating North and South Bruny. The thin stretch of land is a traffic route for Little Penguins, who cross the road to feed and nest.
Where the Tasman Sea meets the Great Southern Ocean, on The Friar Islands off Bruny, male Fur Seals congregate by the smelly hundreds.
Just around the corner from Captain Cook’s original landing place, we discover a ‘garden’ of cairns. Evidence that many other feet have stepped here before ours.
Hadyn’s fishing efforts pay off. “Look at this!” he shouts eagerly, reeling two Wrasse out of the shallows. Dinner is served.
And what a dinner: fresh seafood, sunset view, no shoes allowed. Eating by headlamp, with mosquitoes in your face, is a treat for which we’d gladly spend another weekend on Bruny Island.
~ Until the next adventure! ~ Kelli