Bay of Fires
February 7, 2026 (continued)
After leaving Launceston, we drove about three hours to the east coast, passing through small agricultural towns and some dense forests with huge ferns. We passed through the towns of Scottsdale and St Helens, which is where we will be staying tonight, on our way to the Bay of Fires. Bay of Fires is a stretch of the coast which features attractive orange tinged granite rocks and white sand beaches.
We drove from St Helens to the town of Binalong Bay, the only town in the Bay of Fires area. We continued just past the town to a nice viewpoint, and then we returned to the town and had lunch at what appeared to be the only restaurant (or even commercial business) in the town.
These two photos are from the Binalong viewpoint. The photo below is of the beach taken from near our lunch stop.
After eating pizza with a beautiful view of the beach, we drove north along the coast for about 20 minutes to one of the best known spots in the Bay of Fires called the Gardens. We explored the granite rocks and beach and then worked our way back south stopping at five or six different areas for views of the turquoise water and granite boulders, many with the customary orange tinge.
Some places we saw people swimming, but we thought it was a little cool in the water. We looked it up and the temperature of the water today was 63°F, a bit chilly. The sun was warm and bright, though!
Two photos of the Gardens
The best stop was at Sloop Rock Lookout, where we took a ten minute walk through the bush to huge boulders having a view of a rock that looks like a hand flipping someone off!
These were taken from Taylor’s Beach, just before Sloop Rock look-out.
Below are several photos from the look-out.
Our last stop was a beautiful beach called Cosy Corner, shown below.
From there we drove fifteen minutes or so back to St Helens and checked in to our hotel.
We then walked around for a bit and wondered if a bomb had gone off. The town was practically asleep, whereas three hours earlier, the sidewalks were full of people. We eventually found signs of life and settled into an outdoor beer garden to enjoy the nice temperature before tomorrow’s cooler weather and possible rain. Then hordes of people suddenly appeared for a local concert, and we had to scurry to find a space available for dinner. A very odd place, not our favorite town in Tasmania.
February 8, 2026
After having breakfast in St Helens, not an easy task on a Sunday when many places were closed, we headed south along the coast for about an hour. We visited a wildlife park, East Coast Nature World. There we had the opportunity to feed kangaroos and wallabies. The kangaroos would grab your hand with theirs and not let go until they ate all of the food you held! Here are a hungry kangaroo and a more patient white wallaby.
We watched a Tasmanian Devil feeding, which was a bit gruesome, as they devoured a piece of wallaby with its foot attached. We heard some more about the fate of the devils, although this keeper was optimistic about the species’ ability to survive the fatal tumor disease. He said that the facility had released tumor-free devils onto Maria Island (which we will visit in a few days). They had quite a few devils on display here.
Several Tasmanian devils. Look at the teeth on the one upper the right!
We also got better pictures of an echidna and wombat that we did in the wild. We also saw quolls, white wallabies and bandicoots plus some birds, and greatly enjoyed our visit.
We then drove a few minutes to the coastal town of Bicheno, where we wandered around, had coffee and found a place open for lunch on Sundays.
After eating lunch, we drove around the coastal area of the town, stopping at the Bicheno Blow Hole. Here we found more fantastic granite boulders along with the aforementioned Blow Hole. It started to rain, so we moved on, driving about a half hour south to Coles Bay, the main town on Freycinet Peninsula.
The Bicheno blowhole. Below is a short video.
We then drove west a few minutes and checked in to our hotel on the shore of Oyster Bay.
After checking in and sorting out our activities planned over the next three days, we took a stroll down to the beautiful Muirs Beach located just below the lodge. When we went to the Lodge’s lounge around five o’clock, we had a lovely view of the bay and the mountains across the way (called the Hazards), as the sun had come out.
Above is Muir’s Beach.
Below is the view from our hotel, still with clouds.
Here is the map showing our route from Bay of Fires to Freycinet
Next, we will spend two days exploring the area around Freycinet National Park.
