The Third Week 05/02/2012 to 11/02/2012

Big4 caravan park St Helens – damned expensive. No wonder people look for free camp sites. We stayed three nights, the second night we thought we were going to get blown to the other side of Tassie, my god the wind was so strong, in came the awning, chairs folded up under the van, the rather large gum tree behind the van was making all sorts of noises. I was thinking, great where will I get a new solar panel when the branch breaks off this bloody tree. The tree, caravan and us survived the night and we live to go on another day. We had planned after our few nights at the Big4 that we would moved up the coast a little and stay in the Bay of Fires Conservation Area. (The area was called Bay of Fires by young Jimmy Cook on his voyage up the coast. Apparently the red lichen on the rocks looked like fire, that's the Poms for ya.) This plan was successfully scuttled by the amount of people that were still in residence as the school holidays are still in full swing in Tassie. They only have 3 terms of school so most of them don’t return until around 15^th Feb.

BAY OF FIRES

On our way to St Helens from Scottsdale we saw a sign for a cheese factory a Pyengana. So, a tasting we will go, and taste we did a very pleasant range of cheddars they were too.

Talking to one of the local next to us in the park and he told us of a pleasant area down the coast a little that he had stayed at a couple of nights earlier. The area was a lot better than Bay of Fires.

Off we go to Lagoon Beach about 30kls north of Bicheno, a free camp site, just off the beach in a lovely bush area. A camp fire each night, pleasant surroundings with nice people in the adjoining vans and motor homes.

LAGOON BEACH CAMPSITE

During our stop at Lagoon Beach we took a drive up Elephant Pass to St Marys and on to Fingal. Elephant Pass has of all things a Pancake Restaurant – yep we stopped, they were great. Fingal is a coal mining town (current) and has some very nice old buildings in both restored and how should I say “in need of some tender loving care”. One in particular took our fancy was a convict era stable in need of a “Grand Design” make over – Kevin would have been impressed. It was only a mere $130,000. The only problem was that Fingal itself wasn’t terribly appealing. On our way to Lagoon Beach I spotted Iron House Brewery so on the way back from St Marys we stopped in for a taste. They had some very nice brews on tap and were only too happy for you to have a tasting. So with a small selection purchased it was off to the camp site for a more in depth tasting.

We enjoyed the rest and relaxation before heading off to Bicheno for a few days.