Day 88 / 2015 - Waiting for the Boat

Returning to Burnie from Strahan and Queenstown signalled the last major attraction we wanted to see. We now had about 10 days before departing this fair state back to the mainland.

We had enjoyed out time in Tassie and for out last days we decided to just move from one free camp to the next untill it was time to go into the Discovery Park in Devonport where we would spend the last few days cleaning up ready for our departure. We heard at Forth there was a nice camp in the showgrounds so went and spent a couple of days there. We also met up with Rick who worked at Bunbury Hospital the same time as we did but now lives in Forth Tasmania.

From Forth we went onto Railton. We had been here before and like the camp although there wasn't much in the town itself it was pretty close to Devonport. We had the car service in Devonport I like to get the car serviced a number of days before we leave an area just in case we have to return to the service agent. We booked into the Nissan Dealer who appeared to do a good job. There was a problem to start with as they couldn't find our booking but traced through the system and found the office guy had booked us in for the day of the phone call not the day we wanted the service. They sorted it out and manage to fit us in and provide a loan car as well. Once serviced the trip to Railton was a sort of quick test towing the van to see if any problems developed after the service.

After a few days at Railton we packed up and transfered over to the Discovery Caravan Park in Devonport. We hadn't realised it was Easter fortunately we had made the booking a week prior as the park was full while we were there. Here we spent the days filling in time by visiting some previous attractions such as the Rasberry Farm and the Ashgrove Cheese Factory. We also caught up on washing and since there were no quarantine restrictions going back we shopped for groceries to save time when we get back on the mainland.

The morning of departure we rose early about 5am. It was the same day as Daylight saving finish which was good on one hand as the boat arrived early but bad on the other we would be getting off at Melbourne in the dark. Another good point was it was Easter Sunday so the traffic in Melbourne hopefully wouldn't be to bad. We planed to overnight at a free camp bay somewhere on the Hume Freeway then next day move onto Shepparton.

Once again we lined up and waited out turn to drive back into the belly of the beast. We parked and taking our bag of goodies headed up to our cabin. Dropping our gear we once again went outside to watch as the boat departed saying our last goodbye to Tasmania. The boat pulls away from the dock travels a few hundred metres up river does a 180 degree turn then powers out into the ocean. Once clear of Devonport we went back to our cabin and decided to snooze for a while waking around lunchtime. This time we were a bit more prepared and had brought sandwiches and coffee with us consuming them in our cabin. We also had a stash of chips, biscuits and cheese in case we got peckish. After another nap we had showers then went up to watch as we entered into Port Phillip Bay staying on deck untill we just about docked against the wharf where we were then called down to our cars ready to get off the boat. 

After a while the vehicles in front started to move and we followed them off into the Port Melbourne night. Eventually getting onto then travelling along the Monash Freeway we turned onto the Western Motorway finally reaching the onramp for the Hume Freeway. Travelling another 50 Km we ended up at a BP service centre where we pulled up next to a couple of other vans. After having takeaway at the McDonalds store we decided this would be as good a place to stop as any and stayed the night as we were too tired to go any further.