Zeehan, Strahan, Queenstown, Glenorchy - Tasmanian Trip Day 5

After the lunch we headed for Zeehan known as “Silver City”. It is the home to Pioneer’s Memorial Museum which features material from west coast and the numerous ships that have been wrecked in the treacherous seas off the coast. We push on to Strahan as there was nothing much to see or do at Zeehan.

Strahan is a coastal town founded in 1883 for prospectors, miners, piners, millers, fisherman, for railway ships and sailors and today for tourists and travelers. This town carries the smell of Huon pine. This great pines is still a bit of mystery due to its oil, Methyl Eugenol, which impregnates the timber.

The oil protects the timber from insect attack and resists rot and insect attack for 10 thousands of years. Strahan do have places of interest like the fish farm and Sarah Island and all required boat cruises or helicopter ride.

We did a short quick round of the town and could not find suitable accommodations; we gave it a miss and headed for Queenstown.

Queenstown is renowned for its mining heritage. Gold and copper deposit was discovered in 1880’s. Copper are still mined at Mount Lyell. There is an underground mine tour and we were late for the tour. We did drive to the mine and no photography was allowed. Other than the copper mine, the town is a quiet town and mainly tourists on tour were put up a night here before heading for Strahan the next day because of its cheap accommodations and bringing tourists' dollars to this town.

There was not much point putting a night here and we decided to drive to Hobart which was 3½ hour drive away. The road out of the town was through high, steep and winding road with no petrol station for the next 100kms or so. The ladies were scared of the deep gorges and narrow winding road.

When we reach the town of Taraleah, we decided to put up a night here in one of the hotel. But my SIL was put off having to share a common toilet and bathroom with the rest of the lodgers. So we were on the road once again in the dark, wet, scary night for Hobart. We reach Glenorchy at 8.30 and booked into a 2 bedroom lodging. It was late and the restaurant was closed and we have no choice but to survive on instance noodles (which we bought along), cheese, bread, coffee and tea for a night.