Endeavour Sailing 11/2/25 Tuesday: 2nd day in Hobart

Finally, a relaxing morning on my holiday, waking at 6:15 a.m. taking it easy with breakfast, a shower and checking my e-mails.

Today I have prebooked planned activates from before I flew into Hobart. First up is the Hobart Convict Penitentiary, where convicts from Britain were imprisoned after being transported all the way from the UK. I knew convicts had been sent to Sydney, but I didn't realise that almost half of them went to Tasmania as well.

Hobart Convict Penitentiary - Chapel still standing

The Hobart Convict Penitentiary was located just over two kilometres away from where I am staying, at least a 30-minute walk, and I had a bit of a muscular headache from carrying my bag on my shoulders yesterday. As I am wearing cargo pants today, I have loaded up my pockets with apples, placed my water bottle into the Julianne made cloth water bottle holder from my sword fighting days on my belt and an umbrella in a pocket. Therefore, all I had in the bag on my back was my Kindle and muesli bars, much lighter.

The tour was very well done, with historic walls and the original chapel from the early 1800's were still standing as it had been turned into a courthouse.

Arrow marks from prisoners, on bricks they made which are used to build the chapel.

The remains of horrendous tiny dark solitary confident cells located under the chapel.

The tour also included excellent use of modern technology with screens and movies / stories which was very clever and interesting, especially as I knew nothing about convict life in Tasmina.

The tour finished at 12 p.m. and my walking tour is not until 2 p.m. There is an old large historic house Narryna - The Merchants House which I was keen to visit.

The challenge was that Narryna is located right next to where I am staying several km away, and my walking tour is only one km away from the Hobart Convict Penitentiary. I did briefly think of just resting until the walking tour, but it was not long before I was rushing at a fast walk to Narryna, arriving at 12:25 p.m. I have seen large historic houses in the UK and NZ and I was keen to see the differences. Narryna was interesting, all built of sandstone, with the typical 1800’s room layout.

The self-directed tour did not take long, and I was finished before 1 p.m. So I took the opportunity to go back to the bunkhouse and relax for 40 minutes which was super nice.

Backyard of Narryna, with Montacute Boutique Bunkhouse where I am staying in the background (white building on the right)

At 1:40 p.m. I headed off for my walking tour. It turns out that I was the only person doing the extended three-hour tour. The first 90 minutes coved a range of early building from the 1830’s onwards, buildings which are older than what we have in New Zealand. It was interesting, but not riveting to be honest.

The second half of the tour which I did alone with the tour guide covered Battery Point was far more interesting as it covered a whole range of early houses and how people used to live back in the early European days of Hobart.

What’s interesting is that there has been a huge push against new apartment blocks, so the roads are full of old houses, it’s like walking back in time.

And unlike in New Zealand where all the old houses are made of wood, almost everything is made from stone. It’s amusing to see colonial houses similar to New Zealand but made from stone.

On completing the walking tour, I phoned the family for a final goodbye before heading off to have dinner, a wallaby burger for the first time. Wallaby meat was like pulled pork but with a much stronger earther flavour, not something I think I will order again, but it was good to try it at least once.

Then back to Montacute boutique bunkhouse. This is a great place to stay, an old villa done up really nicely, I really enjoyed staying here.

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Endeavour Sailing 11/2/25 Tuesday: 2nd day in Hobart