In the shadow of kunanyi, the mountain that rises behind Hobart, a set of high stone walls in South Hobart marks the site of the Cascades Female Factory, where thousands of women convicts transported from Britain and Ireland were held in the nineteenth century. They worked here at laundry, sewing and other labour, and some were punished with solitary confinement, hard work or shaved heads. Many arrived with children, and the death rate among infants was appallingly high. The factory is part of the Australian Convict Sites World Heritage listing, which includes eleven places across Australia that tell the story of the forced migration of convicts and the building of the colony.
Today the site is quiet, with the remains of the walls and yards, an interpretation centre, and dramatised tours that bring the stories of individual women to life. It is a sobering place, but also a moving one, as the descendants of many of these women now number in the hundreds of thousands, and the tours honour their resilience.
Just down the road stands the Cascade Brewery, the oldest operating brewery in Australia, its grand old building set against the forested slopes of the mountain. Above it, the road to the summit of kunanyi climbs through forests of eucalyptus and tree ferns to a height of over twelve hundred metres, with a series of tight bends and steep sections, and a view from the top over Hobart, the Derwent estuary and much of southern Tasmania. The weather at the summit can be bitterly cold and windy, even in summer, and snow and ice can close the road at any time of year.
Hobart, the capital of Tasmania, has fuel, shops and plenty of restaurants, with a lively waterfront, the Salamanca markets on Saturdays, and the provocative MONA museum on the Derwent. Tasmania is a superb place to ride, with quiet roads, varied landscapes and very little traffic outside the towns. The road south to Port Arthur, the most famous of the convict sites, takes you through the Tasman Peninsula, with dramatic coastal cliffs. Watch out for wildlife on the roads, especially at night, when wallabies, possums and wombats are active.