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| The mess hall
at Koonya |
Koonya
A fascinating convict outstation once known
as Cascades
It is easy to forget that Port Arthur was not an
isolated settlement. The whole of the Tasman
Peninsula - Saltwater River, Port Arthur,
Koonya, Eaglehawk Neck and Taranna - was all
part of a larger penal colony. Port Arthur may
have been the largest and most sophisticated of
the settlements but the other places were
important and well developed outstations.
Today Koonya (once known as the convict
outstation of Cascades) offers a rare
opportunity to spend some time living in a
convict settlement and experiencing the
lifestyle of a nineteenth century penal
institution - albeit with all the modern
comforts.
Located 95 km from Hobart and only 15 km from
Port Arthur, Koonya is now literally nothing
more than a few isolated houses and a superbly
restored penitentiary comprising a hospital,
officer's quarters, workshops, chapel, stone
quarries, cell blocks and overseer's quarters
set between the mountains and the sea. It is an
exquisite setting and the accommodation is
unique.
Cascades was established as a convict
outstation in 1841 and by 1846 there were nearly
400 convicts working in the area. In his book
Experiences of a Convict, John Frederick
Mortlock, describes the lifestyle: 'standing on
a narrow, shallow inlet, hemmed in by almost
impervious, thickly wooded, broken ranges, I
soon found myself hard at work, felling an
enormous gum-tree, two hundred feet high, whose
hollow base would have sheltered a dozen men.
This, with digging up of potatoes, and the
carrying bundles of shingles (a small, narrow,
thin piece of wood used instead of slates, for
roofing) some miles through the rugged bush down
to the jetty, was my first experience of Van
Diemen's Land.'
Cascades was a remarkably complete
settlement.
Things to see:
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The Wooden Railway
The convicts built a wooden railway from the
mountains to the sea to bring the felled logs
out of the forests. It is now no longer in
evidence. However the people who host the
Cascades Colonial Accommodation have walks into
the mountains which point out the places where
the convicts worked.
|
| The workshops
at Koonya |
Historic Buildings
The buildings in the area include the old
hospital on one side of the road (it is a large
two storey Georgian building set in an apple
grove and capable of accommodating six people)
and the workshop, mess hall, and officer's
quarters in a group of buildings on the other
side of the road. The workshop has been turned
into a small museum and the officer's quarters,
three connected cottages, have been converted
into superb colonial accommodation. They won an
Australian Heritage award in 1986.
Koonya is a unique holiday experience. The
rooms have been superbly restored, the setting
is charming, the walks to the mountains and to
the sea are fascinating, and the old buildings
form one of the finest collections of early
nineteenth century structures on the island.
