Tasmania revisited

Returning to Tasmania on a journalistic endevour to commemorate the 40 years since destruction of the Tasman Bridge a lot seems to have changed except the population of the state.

It is probably safe to say it now but the day before the bridge was hit I had registered my water taxi company and as the only such service it was hired by the investigators from the Marine Board of Enquiry to run them up and down the river to try and work out what happened. Unfortunately my coxswain was drunk that night and so I pretended to be him and took them out. What was fairly clear from their discussion was that with a red light on the shore beyond the bridge, the helmsman had mistakenly lined this up with the green one on the right of the bridge and steered between them. Pity the bridge pylon was in the way. I don’t think they mentioned this at the official enquiry later. Of course lots of things might not get reported in Tasmania such as the sinking of the Nissan Marui No 8 on Pedro Blanca with the loss of 21 lives. Everyone was at the Hobart Cup when I tried to mount a search operation so the eventual enquiry was adjourned never to be reopened rather than give Premier Eric Reece or Labor President Neil Batt a problem, and the Japanese wanted it to go away rather than admit they were fishing inside Australian waters. Or when the Lake Pender Action Committee staged that Tiger Moth protest flight to Canberra where it was supposed to get lost on the way back to create publicity. Problem was it remains lost…

Anyway, great to revisit old places such as my house in Battery Point where I moved driven out of my waterfront at Howrah by the bridge demise, Mt. Wellington’s summit unchanged still with no toilets and even the sadder sites remain, such as the Don Camille restaurant at Sandy Bay where I had the last meal with my close friend Dr Lance Buckingham the day before he died, where he said he was deciding on whether to kill himself or his wife. The way she laughed at his funeral he might have made the wrong decision. It haunts me still that I thought he was joking and did nothing.

The old Webster Ltd building is now a Woolworths but my favourite Mures’ Fish House is now on the waterfront, not a patch on the original in Battery point only more expensive. Jill Mure was an original not to be equalled but the current mob are boasting they have been there since the mid-70s when I first wrote Mura’s up under my NOSH resteraunting column. Saddler’s’ Court at Richmond still features Roger Murphy paintings I used to buy and Port Arthur penal colony is still the same pile of ruins but now you need to pay. But the Ball and Chain restaurant in Salamanca place now “grill” was a great meal and still a top spot since when two days after buying it for Webster I featured on the front page of the Mercury having set it on fire. Actually Ian Brampton with his over exuberant rotisserie set the fire when the years of grease in the flue caught but it was my lunch party so I took the blame. As an aside, the German bakery in Sandy Bay is not to be missed serving the best sausage rolls I’ve ever eaten.

Having been at the opening of Wrest Point Casino and head of a consortium aiming at one in Launceston, Wrest Point can’t ever be the same as in its heyday with the dress code enforced and the pretty girls in green low cut gowns which had to be replaced after female patrons complained they were being outshone. As State Conveyor of Gordon Barton’s Australia Party I was at the opening, set up the travel office staffed by Tommy Clift but although taking clients there almost daily was eventually warned off for always winning on a system my father perfected at Monti Carlo. Winnable system but boring. A lot of the rest of the Island was a bit disappointing with pretentious restaurants such as the Royal Thai serving the most expensive Thai meal I’ve ever had, and sea food of poorer qualify and higher price than I can get in Sydney.

OK there is fruit picking and muscles off the beach as great fun for the children but Brunei Island no longer has the crabs one used to buy (I was told the Council of old fogies wants to keep out development) while elsewhere I was told crayfish now go straight to Asia China included and they are so scarce locally each animal is tagged for sale. Gone are the days where I could put a pot out on the way to Port Arthur and pull up 15 to 20 crays overnight. Like when I came home in a hurry, emptied the bag into the bath tub before rushing for lunch to find at midnight on return that they had escaped and hidden all over the house. Problem was I didn’t know how many I had and was finding them for days. I’m also not sure if hotels understand free Wi-Fi means it actually needs to work but even in top hotels it didn’t. Fuel prices are as if you were on the mainland a few months ago but then again parking spaces are easy to find so you don’t waste petrol going around in circles. Talking of traffic, speed limits are realistic after the mainland and so no one speeds. A lesson there?

My 42' Ferro-cement yacht Privateer I am told still lies on the bottom outside Dunalley Canal where John Schiffer helped sink it before he was sent to hospital but luckily no one at the Yacht Club seems to remember that.

With the population remaining constant and the young off to the mainland as soon as they can for lack of jobs, one has to remember where for example Cadbury chocolates now is really only a mixing and packaging plant remaining simply because it was there originally because of the clean water and Hydro concessions. Economically there is little to attract industry particularly when having to fight the Greens every step of the way. Tasmania is already suffering from what will really hit the mainland soon, since now even professional services are being outsourced with accountants and lawyers getting the grunt work done in India or The Philippines for a song and the then the partner just signs off on it in Australia. All legal, sort of.

Still some identities remain as The Mercury reminded me that former Miss Tasmania Sue Hicky is now Lord Mayor of Hobart: looking good. Other people seem to have disappeared. People are friendly and at Coles when you ask where something is they actually walk you to the isle and the product. They make you buy shopping bags which means you need to buy plastic bags for your rubbish but that is probably again the Greens. The Spirit of Tasmania gets you and your car there and back with the cleanest toilets anywhere and free iced water but don’t be fooled by their request to come early since you are still kept waiting in the queue and first on means last off. And don't take as gospel their advertised departure or arrival times. I would recommend flying.

Overall Tasmania is as they say a great place to visit but I like so many others seem to have decided, they don’t want to live there…