This Aussie road trip is outstanding, even if my car isn't

Sydney Morning Herald

27-05-2025

Just a couple of houses past the PM's pad is Hursey Seafood. People come from all over the region to Hursey, for its fish and crayfish fresh off the boat. My package includes a voucher to eat here, and I make the most of it – a platter of crayfish, oysters and more back to the apartment one night and into the restaurant for scallops and fresh stripey trumpeter the next.
You can take a short chairlift ride if you want, but Stanley's intriguing Nut isn't that hard a climb and the sea views are plentiful from the track that circles the top of it. There's a surprise in store below the Nut, at Godfrey's Beach – here the Parks Service has built a viewing platform to admire the little penguins, returning at dusk to feed their offspring.
If you don't want the 15-minute walk to Godfrey's, you can cross the road below the Ship Inn and head to the rock wall that wraps around the beach at the head of Stanley Harbour. Come dusk from September to March, there they'll be – the little tackers squawking for food as Mum and Dad return from a forage at sea.
Back on the road (the Golf's warning light is now telling me to 'stop and contact workshop' but after a few minutes it vanishes, so we battle on) and we're now backtracking east, past Devonport and on to the next stop, the Vineyard House at Ghost Rock Wines, near Port Sorrell.
Ghost Rock is the creation of the Arnold family – 31 hectares under vines and wine under two labels, the premium Ghost Rock, and the minimum intervention Supernatural – wines that 'go against all the traditions – no filtration, no additives,' in the words of Justin Arnold.
The stay here starts with a tasting – working through the winery's fruity but flinty 2019 Catherine sparkling, a selection of whites and eventually arriving at the 2023 Climat pinot noir, a sublime wine created from a spray-free experimental plot and coming in light but earthy.
The tasting is a handy prelude to lunch at the winery restaurant – both are Ship to Shore inclusions – and on this clear day, lunch is out on the sunny terrace, vineyards in the foregound, then some farmland and then the blue expanse of Bass Strait in the distance, something Arnold calls, 'our great big air conditioner'.
Lunch is fresh and seasonal, and I have no need to worry about drinking and driving (or the Golf and its complaints) – Vineyard House, albeit hidden in vast gardens, is all of 20 metres from the restaurant door. Home for the next couple of nights, there's plenty of space here – three bedrooms, open-plan living, big kitchen and dining area and spectacular views of the surrounding country.
There's a platter of local cheeses and other treats, along with two bottles of Ghost Rock wine – a sparkling and a pinot – as well as a selection of bread, jams and cereal for breakfast. On top of those supplies, there's a kitchen garden just out the door, meaning fresh seasonal fruit and vegetables are there for the picking.
Beyond the winery, and the house you could well sit back and enjoy for the rest of your stay, there are beach walks nearby at Port Sorrell and Hawley Beach, or, facing Bass Strait on Northdown Beach. Devonport is 15 minutes away for supplies and other restaurant selections.
Next, and final, stop is Launceston and while I could hit the highway and cover the ground in a bit over an hour (warning lights permitting), I decide to detour, leaving the highway at Sassafrass to amble through the countryside, through farmland and forest, past truffle farms and, not far offtrack, a rarity in Tasmania – sustainable salmon from the inland 41 South salmon farm.
Eventually we come into Deloraine on the Mole Creek Road, the mountain-fed Meander River spilling through the town. Coffee in hand from Frank and Lotti's on Emu Bay Road, I give the Golf a breather and enjoy the coffee in the park down by the river.
From Deloraine, it's a 40-minute drive into Launceston for boutique bliss and a welcoming bottle of sparkling wine and some snacks in a suite at Stillwater Seven. The small hotel and its restaurant are converted from an old flour mill. This part of the package includes two nights' accommodation, dinner for two in the restaurant and breakfast provisions in the room.
The rooms come with huge timber beams, views over the river and a stunning piece of furniture designed by Launceston's Simon Anchor that is the mini-bar (unusually for a hotel, its contents are very well priced).
Dinner is at the restaurant with some inspired Tasmanian dishes, not least the octopus that has followed me all the way here from Stanley, topped with bonito flakes that might be waving in the wind.
After a DIY breakfast (including croissants delivered fresh in the morning), to walk off the indulgence, the track into the Cataract Gorge starts just across the road from Stillwater and has to be one of the world's best city walks given the stunning scenery of rock, river and forest. Keep walking and if it's a hot day there's a free-to-use public pool on the lawns of First Basin.