Friday 4th January

We slept in again and had breakfast in the lodge’s restaurant at about 8:45am. After breakfast, we checked out and went for a short walk to the Dove River waterfall.

On the way to the north coast, we stopped at Hellyer Gorge for another short walk. The petrol gauge was getting close to empty but there was little sign of civilisation. There were a few very tiny towns but no petrol stations.

Eventually, we came over a hill and could see the Bass Strait. At the same time, we got mobile phone reception at last. At the town of Wynyard (yes it is a town called Wynyard as I didn’t see a railway station – underground or otherwise), we found a Woolworths petrol station and filled up.

Next door there was a visitors information bureau and so we went in to get maps of the area. We drove to Fossil Bluff which is a large hill next to the beach. Further along the coast, we stopped to take more photos until we reached Boat Harbour. There, we had lunch at a nice café on the beach called Jolly Rogers.

It was only about another hour to Stanley. We got there at about 3:45pm. The B&B is a nice old house that has five guest rooms. A couple from the UK had arrived just before us and were settling into the dining room for their welcome cuppa. After taking our bags to our room, we joined them in the dining room for a cup of coffee.

Maxine, our hostess, gave us a rundown on the choices for restaurants for tonight’s dinner. She booked for us at Julie & Patrick’s Seafood Restaurant which is within walking distance of the B&B.

At the end of the peninsula, there is a large flat-topped hill called The Nut. We decided to take the chairlift up to the top rather than walk up the steep path. Up the top, there is a path that goes from one lookout to another. It takes about 45 minutes to do the full circuit. It was a very windy day in Stanley – it was even more windy on top of The Nut.

On the way back we strolled through the town centre. We were back in our room at about 6pm.

We walked down to the restaurant for dinner. It was an interesting experience. The food turned out to be very good indeed but the service was a good example of what not to do in looking after customers.

When we arrived, the waitress was dashing back and forwards between the tables with little acknowledgement of our presence. She was the only waitress.

In one of her dashes back towards the kitchen, she asked if we had a booking to which we confirmed that we did. She didn’t ask for our name but just hurriedly suggested that we sit at a particular table. I got the impression that she would have preferred that we hadn’t booked so she could get rid of us.

There was a misunderstanding about the wine. I wanted a bottle of wine but she brought me a glass. I pointed out the misunderstanding and reminded her several times before she brought me the bottle.

When she did bring it, it was a different wine from the one I ordered. When I pointed this out, she said she didn’t have time to get the wine I’d ordered. She said both of them were pinot noir.

From my experience, waiters normally show you the bottle and ask if it’s the right one and then give you the opportunity to test it. There was none of this – she deposited the bottle without explanation in one of her dashes from table to table.

Needless to say, I didn’t leave a tip. I wouldn’t be in a hurry to recommend them for their service. We decided to go back to the B&B for coffee.

At 10:15pm, Graham (our B&B host) took us out with his torch to see the penguins. He’d built rookeries for the penguins in his garden. He then took us across the road past the cemetery and to the beach to see lots more. We saw lots of penguins at close range. They seemed very tame because we got within a metre of most of them.