Today, we visited Port Arthur. We were lucky enough to go on three different tours.

1. Isle Of The Dead tour: we boarded a boat that took us across some water to a very small island. This island is where they buried everyone, convicts and free settlers included. But, whilst the fact that they buried one and all on the same small island may appear to indicate a rather even, fair and unbiased society, this was not the case. They still found a way to seperate the different ‘classes’ of people. The good, important people were on the higher side of the island (perhaps just that little bit closer to heaven?), and the bad convicts on the lower (perhaps a little closer to hell?). We all found the tour to be extremely fascinating and eye-opening! Our tour guide was actually a descendant of one of the men buried on the island!
2. Introductory Tour: this tour took us around the main part of the settlement. We learnt about the main buildings and was has happened to them thus far. It is, really, just because of the tourists that the buildings are so well looked after these days.
3. Point Puer: Point Puer was where all the convict boys, aged between 9 and 17 went. There were up to 700 hundred boys in an area of 2.5 acres. The idea was to keep the younger ones away from the influence of older convicts. However, in the end, a lot of the teachers and people in charge on Point Puer were ex-convicts. Boys were deemed useless and girls useful, hence why the girls were sent to the female factory to become servants, and the boys just left on Point Puer.

On the way home, we stopped at the naturally Tessellated pavement, Doo Town (where most of the house have names like Doo Drop Inn, Doo you?,  Doo I?, Doodle Doo, Gunna Doo, Can Doo, Toucan Doo, and many more!). At Doo Town we also had Fish ‘n’ Chips for dinner at the blowhole!

 On the way to Port Arthur, we had to stop when they opened up the road to let a boat through!

 This is the main building of the Port Arthur settlement. This building was actually built to be a wheat mill, however it proved to be a rather unsuccessful venture, and closed within a year of opening. Then it became storage for supplies needed in the settlement. Interestingly enough, the bars on the windows were not installed when it later became a convict gaol, but they were put in while it was a place of storage to keep the supplies in and the thieves out! When it finally became a gaol, they had solitary confinement sells down on the ground floors. Basically, the way it worked was that they had the worst prisoners down on the bottom floors, and the ‘best’ prisoners on the top. The top floor had many more privileges. Towards the end of the convict settlement era, the grounds became somewhat of an Old People’s Home because all the convicts that had spent the most part of their life there had no where else to go.

 The convicts were not supposed to have headstones, so most of the headstones and memory stones or head stones of more important people.

 Pacific Gulls – juvenile

 Pacific Gulls

 A White Faced Herron having a bad hair day
 White Faced Herron having a good hair day.

  The beach at Puer Island looking over to The Isle of the Dead.

 Point Puer

 Tasman Arch

 Some more magnificent coastline!

 A crayfish boat

  Fish and chips from the “Doolicious” food Van at Doo Town.

 Don’t pat the puppy!

 Look who’s in the dog house now!

 Hodded Plovers on the beach at Eaglehawk Neck

 Tessellated Pavement at Eaglehawk Neck.

Tara