It was cooler this morning, so I didn’t head out quite as early for my walk – although it was still quite dark.

I started my walk just across the road from us around Georges Bay. I was under instruction from Mick to keep my eye out for fishermen returning with loads of fish they might want to sell to me.

I was handicapped on my walk as well because I could not listen to my phone. I have absolutely no phone signal in this village. I’ve noticed signs around the roads (here and on our travels) alerting locals that an improved phone coverage is coming. I don’t think it will be here before we leave though. Luckily, I can use wifi at our accommodation.

I mentioned this village is a fishing village, and today I found some evidence for Mick. Unfortunately it wasn’t edible, but it does show they take fishing seriously here.

Mick and I drove to St Helens Point – almost the most easterly point of Tasmania at 148.2498°E. Eddystone Point (about 70km north of here) is listed as having this honour at 148.3216°E. But you’d have to admit, there is not much in it.

St Helens Point is a popular fishing spot for what looked like professional as well as recreational fishermen – based on the size of the trailers that were parked there.

It is so beautiful here, I even impressed myself with my own photos. But I’ll include only one more.

Mick suggested we head back to the Waterfront in search of …..

You guessed it. Fishermen.

But sadly, there was no joy. Or rather, no fresh seafood to be had. In the end, we settled on lamb crumbed cutlets for dinner. They will certainly go with the reds we bought today.

After lunch we visited two local wineries, and were treated to two new (and very different) experiences.

Here we were served by the winegrower – Julie. She, and her family have owned the vineyard since 2008. The cellar door was the converted shearing shed.

There were four wines on offer to be tasted for a fee of $8. But as there were two of us, the price dropped to $15.

Julie had a developed a very Covid-safe way of tasting the wines. We were each given a glass with our first wine – Sauvignon Blanc. And we were given a tray with 3 plastic cups with small amounts of the other three wines – Pinot Gris, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. A jug of water added the final touch, allowing us to rinse out our glasses before serving ourselves the next wine for tasting.

We learnt that the winemaker used by this vineyard is Brian Franklin, owner and operator of Aspley Gorge Vineyard and Winery, situated close to Bicheno.

Mick and I tasted one of his Pinot Noirs during our visit to the Bicheno Farm Shed two days ago. Information displayed on a poster while we were visiting mentioned…

Brian took over winemaking in the late 1990’s and quickly became noticed as an exceptional winemaker. His winemaking skills in the traditional French style were honed originally with Phillipe Charlopin, one of Burgundy’s most notable winemakers. Brian has worked every vintage in Burgundy since 2000, lately working with Phillip’s son Yann at Domain Charlopin-Tissier.

We both really liked the Chardonnay, but restricted ourselves to only one bottle (the Pinot Noir) – as we have only a week to go, and far too many bottles already in the car.

Next stop….

The difference with this wine tasting was that it was very ‘grass roots’.

We tasted the wine sitting around the family’s outside table, while we could smell the smoke from the wood fired pizza oven that was being prepared for the family’s dinner.

The wines were served by Geoff Wells, the winegrower and winemaker. He has been making wines at this location for 16 years.

We left with two bottles of red here – as we felt a little sorry for the wine maker. Mick liked the Pinot Noir and I liked the Gamay Noir.

Yes – we are going to have to get cracking to be able to finish all these wines – we have less than a week to go!!