UnspecifiedCredit: Tourism Tasmania
Sarah Maguire enjoys a girlie weekend in Swansea with an Asian twist.
Great Oyster Bay is shimmering blue in the winter sun, just beyond the headland where four of us are standing, scratching our beanie-covered heads, trying to pronounce the longest word we've come across in a while. Loointitetermairrelehoiner Walking Track, says the sign. Two of us think it might be French, someone else Dutch, because we know both nationalities had explorers in the area. One of us guesses correctly. It is Aboriginal, the name of the local band that roamed this part of Tasmania's east coast before European farmers, soldiers and convicts arrived in the 1820s. After a patchy start, the settlement became the little seaside town known today as Swansea, where we've come to spend a girls' weekend.
Swansea is seriously historic in terms of the buildings that survive from its early British settlement, but it is a little slice of Japan that has lured us here. Kabuki by the Sea was the talk of Tasmania when it opened in 1992: a Japanese restaurant on an isolated clifftop at Rocky Hills, 10 kilometres out of Swansea and 135 from the capital? The audacity of the two Sydney restaurateurs who had left the big smoke behind was applauded. It was a new level of sophistication for Tassie. Sixteen years later, with seven Ryokan-style cottages lined up along the cliff as well as the restaurant, Kabuki still strikes as a novelty. Swansea, of all places, you can't help thinking.
It's not the only surprise Swansea has for us.
It might be the middle of winter, but it seems the sunshine is guaranteed - the area has been in drought for years. The sheep are the same colour as the dusty paddocks that stretch virtually to the bay as we drive to Rocky Hills.
On the way is Spiky Bridge, built by convicts in the 1840s on the coach road connecting Swansea to Hobart. It's not known why the engineer placed countless shafts of jagged field rock vertically into the parapet - maybe folly, maybe to stop cattle straying over the sides - but the effect is arresting. As attractions go, this is an extraordinary one and we are the only tourists within cooee.
Maybe because it's a quiet time of year, everything we stumble across feels like a grand discovery. Following a series of little signs that lead us off the Tasman Highway and up a hill, we come to Kate's Berry Farm. It has gorgeous views across the berry fields to Great Oyster Bay and the Freycinet Peninsula beyond, and a cafe that serves only desserts, all home-made. Hot, crisp Belgian waffles come with "lashings" of poached berries and vanilla seed ice-cream. There are strawberry and raspberry tarts and hot scones with jam and cream.
The cellar door has shelves full of fruit and berry products, made on the premises and available nowhere else. As well as jams of the usual varieties, you can buy Man's Jam made of blackberries and bourbon, and Adult Jam, made of strawberries and Grand Marnier, or raspberries with Cointreau.
The busy woman herself appears ("A lot of people think there is no Kate, but there is a Kate" one of her employees has just finished telling a customer). Kate Bradley tells us she's been finishing off the workshop in which she is about to start making chocolate - real chocolate with only fresh ingredients, following the Belgian tradition. As if she hasn't made things decadent enough already.
In Swansea itself, the Ugly Duck Out Cafe's version of decadence is its long liqueur coffee menu and 13 types of schnapps. It's a menu we weren't expecting, along with the emphasis on organic produce. As it's morning, we have organic flat whites sans alcohol and inspect the artworks for sale: the Roadkill Collection stands out, tiny skulls of native wildlife painted in bold colours and mounted on recycled metal.
At Kabuki by the Sea, our two-bedroom ryokan feels a bit bonsai with four adults squeezed in, but there's nothing small about the view. Once again, Great Oyster Bay stretches, magnificently, before us, except this time there's nothing between us but some weather-beaten she-oaks and a cliff.
We dine one night in Kabuki's restaurant. "Tasmanian fare with a Japanese flair" it promises, and asks us to "disarm" our mobiles. I bypass dishes like the Japanese eel and local seaweed in rice vinegar for Michi's Magic Bento, which is very meaty and too big to finish. Talking later, we decide the restaurant is off its game, at least on the night we dined. Swansea has come a long way in 16 years: there are at least two restaurants in town that would impress any city slicker, as they have the locals we talk to, with their menus and their ambience: the Banc, in an old heritage bank building, and Ebb, in a two-year-old waterfront building with floor-to-ceiling views. It may be time for Kabuki to play catch-up in the gastronomy department, although it's hard to imagine anyone beating its outlook, nor the fabulous artworks in its ryokans. And there's nowhere else in town with an antique Japanese doll display.
There is, however, another slice of Asia: Gallery One Nine in Franklin Street has four rooms bursting with imports, from homewares and fine art to jewellery and antiques, as well as clothing designed by the proprietor, Suzanne Williamson, and made in Vietnam. It's a browser's nirvana, and you're unlikely to walk out without a purchase.
Back on the Loointitetermairrelehoiner track around Waterloo Point, the town's European past at last has our attention, specifically "the melancholy occurrence" of 1850, when Swansea residents Thomas and Mary Ann Large lost their six children in a shipwreck in Great Oyster Bay.
"We kept hold of them as long as we could ... until the sea washed them away," quotes the plaque that overlooks the ship's rusting anchor, recovered in 1982 off Waterloo Point. The grave of the six children is a short walk away, their names still clear against a white headstone. The oldest, Elizabeth, was 12; the youngest only 2.
The discovery is a sad one but a reminder of the history and nature that's all around in Swansea, beyond the clutch of sophisticated latter-day attractions. All together, they make Swansea a destination with plenty to keep a traveller enthralled for several days - the best surprise of all.
TRIP NOTES
Getting there: Jetstar and Virgin Blue fly direct from Sydney to Launceston and Hobart. Swansea is about 135 kilometres from both cities. From Launceston, take the Midlands Highway; from Hobart, the Tasman Highway.
Staying there: Kabuki by the Sea, Rocky Hills, Tasman Highway, Swansea, phone (03) 6257 8588, see http://www.kabukibythesea.com.au. Weekend packages including two nights' accommodation and a three-course meal are $275 for two people, $385 for three people, and $434 for four.
Further information: See www.discovertasmania.com.
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