Self Guided Bruny Island Walk

TRANSFERS: Morning flight from Hobart to Bruny Island. Afternoon: After your walk your driver will meet you and transfer you to your accommodation.

WALK GRADE: 4.2km return trip.  Easy to follow track up Mount Mangana.  Large roots and stones, like any good bushwalk, but not difficult or technical.  A climb (and later, descent) of 121 metres.  Easy-grade.  Basic fitness required. 2.5 – 3 hours walking, with breaks.

WALK ITINERARY: Make your way to Hobart airport for your included flight to Bruny Island.  Upon arrival on Bruny Island be transferred to the start of your walk. Your walk begins as high as a car can get atop the highest mountain of Bruny Island.  As soon as you enter the trail, even on a sunny day, you will know you have entered into a magical pocket of rainforest, as the sunlight falls away and dapples across the thick forest floor.  A steady,  but relatively gentle climb takes you through slowly up to the peak of Mount Mangana.  As you go you will pass by many endemic Tasmanian temperate rainforest species that are seldom found anywhere but the wet and rugged West Coast.  But here, where rainfall tops one metre a year and cloud cover allows a temperate rainforest micro-climate, you will find them. To see leatherwood (Eucryphia lucida) or celery to pine (Phyllocladus aspleniifolius) growing on the East Coast is something special.  And that is exactly what this walk is: something special. Upon your return to the trailhead, you will meet your driver who will whisk you away to your magical cottage in the foothills of the mountain you just climbed. Tonight enjoy a simple seasonal farmhouse evening meal and soak up the scenery of this pretty farm cottage.

TRANSFERS:  After breakfast, your driver will transfer you south 35 minutes to the start of this walk.

WALK GRADE: 18.3km circuit.  Technically easy trail, but can be long and arduous for some.  One hill of just over 100 metres.  Last half is slightly more technical than first half, but still not that tricky.  Decent-to-good fitness required.  5.5 – 7 hours with breaks.

ITINERARY:  After breakfast, your driver will transfer you to the start of the walk. The Labillardiere Peninsula was named after the first person to produce a book on the plants of Australia.  He was a lover of flowers, and flowers is what you will get on this walk.  Beginning strolling along the north-western edge of the peninsula, you will amble through fields of blossoming coastal heath, with wildflowers of every colour on display for most of the year.  After descending the only major hill of just over 100 metres, you arrive on a secluded little beach, perfect for lunch, or a private little swim. As you head down the eastern edge of the peninsula, the habitat will be overtly different from that which you passed in the morning, with the coastal heath being dwarfed by a forest of eucalypts, she-oaks, native cherries and dozens of other woodland species. Upon completion of the circuit, your driver will be there to run you to your idyllic cottage for a well-deserved rest. Tonight enjoyed a relaxed restaurant dinner.

TRANSFERS:  A quick 4-wheel drive over Mount Mangana will bring you to Adventure Bay and your final walk. Afternoon: Short transfer to Bruny Island airstrip for your return flight to Hobart.

WALK GRADE: 6.5 km circuit.  A short walk, mostly easy, except for one very steep section. The path comes close to sheer cliffs. Open forest for the most part and not too technical.  Steep section = climb of almost 300 metres over 1.7km.  Medium grade.  Average fitness required.  3-3.5 hours.

ITINERARY: After breakfast, your driver will drop you at the start of your walk near Adventure Bay.  Drifting through different eucalypt habitats and she-oak forests, you will arrive at Grass Point and the ruins of an old whaling station.  Just across the way is Penguin Island accessible at low tide and fun to get to via hopping from rock to rock. Climbing up Fluted Cape proper, you are presented with lookout after lookout, as you get higher and higher, the sheer cliffs just metres from your feet both daunting and amazing. When you do arrive at the top, the views north, up the East Coast, are jaw-dropping.  Standing 272 metres above the sea, you are only 30 metres shy of the highest vertical sea cliffs in the southern hemisphere – which you can see from here, up the coast, on the Tasman Peninsula. Cutting back inland through the woodlands, the descent is smooth and easy, bringing you back to East Cove, where you can walk straight into the Bruny Island Cruises’ Seafood Restaurant for lunch.  After lunch, you will meet your driver who will bring you and your luggage to the Bruny Island airstrip for your flight back to Hobart.