A Tiger Snake, Flat Tire, and Mediocre Pie: A Tasmania Hike and Bites Adventure to Cape Hauy

Welcome to my 4th installment of Tasmania Hikes and Bites, where we find epic hikes accompanied with delicious food to fuel the journey. We’ve climbed Mt. Amos, explored the alpine lakes in Mt. Field National Park, and made it all the way to the southernmost part of the island. For this “episode”, we headed to Tasman National Park to do one of my favorite walks in Tasmania: Cape Hauy.

The first time we tackled Cape Hauy was in 2020, and the trip didn’t go so smoothly. We forgot the sleeping bag and had our food devoured by possums. Read about it HERE! I can’t say our return went smoothly either…. but those always tend to be the travel experiences I cherish the most!

Let’s dive into our day trip to Cape Hauy with a stop at Dunalley Bakery.

The National Park: Tasman National Park

The Tasman National Park spans across 107.5 km² of the Tasman Peninsula. It’s famous for it’s striking capes formed by dolerites. The tale of dolerites begins 175 million years ago. Molten magma pushed its way up from the earth into existing rock, and quickly cooled and crystalized. The change in temperature caused long, vertical cracks, which creates a column-like appearance. It’s mind boggling that nature can naturally produce something so exquisitely beautiful.

The Three Capes Track is 48km, 4 days/3nights trek that takes you past all 3 capes: Cape Pillar, Cape Raoul, and Cape Hauy. It’s one of the most popular multi-day trek in Tasmania, and while you can camp it, you can also stay in luxury cabins.

If a multi-day trek isn’t your jam, you can see Cape Hauy and Cape Raoul via day trips. Cape Raoul is a 16km return walk that had world class views. But the journey there is downhill, meaning the journey back is uphill. Cape Hauy also offers wild vistas, but the track is only 10km return and it has more variation in elevation and scenery. It’s one of my favorite walks in Tasmania, and the one we opted to do.

The Hike: Cape Hauy

The Cape Huay walk starts in the picturesque Fortescue Bay, which is a popular locale for camping, swimming, fishing, and kayaking. Past the camping area you’ll find a day parking lot where the start of the Cape Hauy trail begins.

The trail is 9.4km/5.8mi return, and it starts in a forested area with stretches of dirt paths and boardwalk. About an hour in, it spits you out the trees to reveal a winding staircase leading up and down the hills of the cape. The vista is other worldly and something that seems more worthy of a movie than a real life experience.

After traversing up and down the stairs, you are rewarded with insane views of the dolerites that inspire those, “How lucky am I to exist in a world that’s this beautiful?!” types of thoughts.

On the journey back, wildlife spotting #1 was an echidna waddling around on the cape. Wildlife spotting #2 was a black tiger snake. It slithered on a grassy area near the boardwalk, and we stepped way back as it settled into a tight knot. There are only 3 types of snakes in Tasmania, and all are venomous. This guy just wanted to mind his own business and was 5 or so feet away, so we deemed it safe to calmly pass by. Obviously taking plenty of photos and videos once we cleared it because it’s not every day you see such a specimen! We also saw a tiger snake in Southwest National Park. I talk more about it in my review of the walk which you can read HERE.

Key Notes:

The walk is categorized as “Grade 3”, meaning moderate. As an avid hiker, I did in fact find it moderate. There are a couple big stretches of inclines, but it isn’t too hard or long.
It took us around 80 minutes each way.
Wait for a clear day to do the trail. A blue sky makes the views that much better. Plus, the cape is exposed to the elements. Rain and high winds will severely impact your experience.
As always, bring water and snacks.

The Bite: Dunalley Bakery

My bite of choice for this Hikes and Bites adventure would have been Taz Doughnuts– a roadside food truck that serves up fresh jam-filled doughnuts. However, something you must know about Tassie is that hospitality venues are open when they want to be open. Taz Doughnuts is only open on the weekends, so we pivoted to Dunalley Bakery.

Dunalley Bakery is a regional bakery serving up all the Australian classics ranging from meat pies to vanilla slices. We sprung for a pepper beef and chicken curry pie as well as a wagon wheel and chocolate lamington. All very Australian items, but all unfortunately unremarkable in flavor.

A wagon wheel is a classic British dessert, but popular in Australia, and it features two biscuits sandwiched together with marshmallow and jam, all coated in chocolate. I loved the chocolate, but the fillings were dry and fairly bland. A lamington is a quintessential Australian dessert that’s made from a sponge cake dipped in a thin layer of chocolate and covered with desiccated coconut. This was actually my favorite bite of the bites, but Jeremy assured me better Lamingtons exist elsewhere.

The pies were warm and perfectly edible. But the pastry was a bit soggy and neither had a hero flavor to write home about.

While these bites were okay at best, thank goodness we got them because of the drama that later ensued….

A flat tire.

As we pulled out of Fortescue Bay, we discovered the left front tire was totally flat. I vaguely remember learning how to change a tire during gym class in middle school, which seems odd now that I recount the memory. But I never needed to put that now forgotten skill to the test. I pulled up a YouTube video as Jeremy got to work. Right as an anxiety-induced argument was budding someone rolled down the window with a , “Do you need a hand?” A young Scottish-sounding, Sydney-living man hopped out of the camper and had our spare on in no time.

The next qualm was that every single nearby repair shop was closed. It was 5:00pm after all…. remember me mentioning life style comes first here in Tassie? So we stayed well below 80km/50mi per hour and rolled back home 3 hours later. Good thing we had all those bites from Dunalley Bakery to fuel the day!