We decided to visit the Woolmers Estate at Longford, Tasmania in the morning of our friends Stephen and Christine’s last day travelling with us. Paul and I felt really at ‘home’ there as the Estate was settled in 1817 by Thomas ARCHER, and was continuously occupied by the Archer family until the last one died without an heir in 1994 and the Estate passed to a Historical Foundation and opened to the public. There were six generations in total. We would love to be able to claim some direct heritage!
Woolmers was a colonial settlement with the original homestead built in 1819. Thomas Archer brought with him a great knowledge of sheep farming from England and became very successful. Eventually his three brothers joined him from England and the surrounding estates belonged to them. The Estate and surrounds were just delightful, capturing different eras, with collections, antiques, machinery, outbuildings, the main house and a wonderful garden of roses and vegetables. There were vast green parklands with lovely deciduous trees and the whole feeling was of being in English countryside. We explored it all in detail and took heaps of photos and declared it a great experience and one to be repeated.
Time was getting short for Stephen and Christine to get to their flight back from Hobart, but we did stop next at Evandale for the National Penny Farthing Championships! Sadly time ran out for them and we said our sad goodbyes, then Stephen and Christine drove like bats out of hell to get their van back and on their flight in time. Paul and I stayed on in Evandale for the rest of the afternoon and enjoyed watching the Penny Farthing heats and parades of old cars, marching bands and fancy dress costumes. It was a very jolly village event and wonderful to see all those experts riding the difficult penny farthing bicycles round the race course in the village centre.
We continued towards Hobart, staying overnight in a rest area. In Hobart we called into the Shelomith Doggie Country Club to check on the dogs who were boarding there,
and drop off some more medicines and special food for Tia. The doggies were all fine after their first week and we were happy to leave them for a second week.
Big News Update: during our time in Tasmania, we had made a big decision to stay in Hobart for the rest of the year, rather than relocating to Melbourne. We both had fallen in love with the City and surrounds – the lovely mountains and hills, fresh “home grown” food, the River Derwent, the wharf area and the warm people, the dog friendly beaches and vibrant but relaxing atmosphere. So we plan to end our travels and start looking for a home to rent, not an easy task with doggies!
We will stay in our motor home in local caravan parks for a week or two while we search for a place to live, and sort out the next phase of our lives. We hope to keep our motor home for a few more months, so we can still explore Tasmania at weekends – there are many places we have to see and places we have passed through much too quickly and want to revisit. Funnily enough we are both looking forward to the cooler winter weather. It will be wonderful to be able to rug up explore the countryside with the dogs and we are well over the sweltering heat of some places we visited on our trip.
So that’s really the end of the 'Archer Travel Blog' –at least for now. Thank you for following us around Australia and we hope you were amused and maybe even inspired by our adventures. Of course we will keep in touch with you all. But for now, take care everyone and don't forget to visit us in Hobart!
Kathryn, Paul, Muffin, Ian and Tia xxxxx
