Margate, Tasmania
A small town on Nort West Bay, Margate is a frequent 'pit-stop' for those travelling south towards Snug, Kettering or Bruny Island. Vineyards, grazing fields and stands of trees surround the town and its approaches.
Where is it?: 20 km south west of Hobart, 7 km south of Kingston, 6 km north of Snug, on the Channel Highway between North-West Bay and the Snug Tiers.
The original Margate township was along Beach Road because coal burning steamers would bring all the supplies by sea. From 1906-1922, the Sandfly Colliery Tramway ran from Margate Wharf to the coal mine at Kaoota. The jetty was about 80 metres long, and could service ships drawing 7 metres.
Margate Train: The Margate Train, formerly the Tasman Limited, is Tasmania's last passenger train. The restored railway carriages of the train, open daily, now house a range of businesses including arts and crafts, bric-a-brac, a specialist book exchange, a pancake restaurant, and the original buffet car is now a cafe. There is also a huge antiques warehouse and second hand shop here, located in an old IXL apple packing shed. The Tasman Limited was built in England in 1950 and served as a passenger service between Hobart and Launceston until 1978. Each week at the Margate Train Sunday Market you can browse stalls of antiques and collectables, crafts, second-hand clothing, plants, and fresh produce.
Brookfield Margate: The historic Brookfield Shed was built in the early 1940s for a German Man called Eugene Klinger. Its purpose was to collect flower and vegetable seeds for Yates Seeds. The slatted drying floor is still in place. Other uses have been Chandlers Seeds, Hops and a Co-Op Apple shed for Henry Jones and Co. Today the complex is a vineyard, function centre and restaurant/cafe and well worth a visit. The mezzanine floor houses the Tudor Court Model Village and German Model Train World.
The cafe/restaurant's healthy diverse menu is suitable for both el fresco and indoor dining. The bright canary room offers you a contrast to the mellow theatre that is often filled with the hum of live music. The program of entertainment with both local and international artists is always available on their website.
Channel Heritage Museum: The Museum features permanent exhibits which explore early exploration, Aborigines, timber, boat building, fruit growing, fishing, sport, churches, transport, the 1967 bushfires, and militaria. The Museum's depiction of a school room, a shop and colonial-style rooms (kitchen, bedroom, laundry, and workroom) display aspects of everyday life in the past. The Electrona Carbide Works was unique in Australia and has its own display. A collection of vintage farming machinery, housed in a separate exhibition space, is an ongoing project. Ph (03) 6267 2333
Location: 1755 Channel Highway (entry off Parish Lane), Margate, Tasmania.
Dru Point Track: A pleasant 30 minute / 1.8km return stroll along the picturesque banks of the North West Bay River, with amazing views over the estuary to the summit of kunanyi / Mt Wellington. Bird lovers, a great variety of waterbirds feed at the estuary - if you're lucky, you might even spot a swift parrot feeding on the nectar from the blossoms of black gums. Out of respect for the Aboriginal people who once camped on the banks of the estuary, an Aboriginal Garden with culturally significant plants has been established near the beginning of the walk.
Inverware Native Gardens: Inverawe Native Gardens is a Tasmanian garden landscaped along traditional landscaping lines. In 2001 this was 22 acres of weeds. Work commeced on the central section and that is the most developed part of the garden. Work continues on more far flung areas.
The gardens were created primarily as a showcase for the natural flora of Tasmania. Plants have been placed in a semi formal landscaped design and walking paths give access to the vast array of plants in its two distinct areas a natural woodlands remnant and a former tidal swamp that has yielded to rich, grassy flats. Rabbit Hill, at the northern end of the grasslands, affords views across the gardens down North West Bay to Bruny Island. Being a fringe habitat, where forest and pasture meet the shoreline, the wetlands and the tidal flats is an ideal place for bird watching. Entry fees apply. Contact: (03) 6267 2020.
Location: 1565 Channel Highway, Margate.
Surrounding Area
Snug/Lower Snug
Snug is a small coastal town located on the Channel Highway. A carbide factory operated at Snug from 1917. The carbide was used in the manufacture of acetylene gas. The factory was converted to a silicon smelter in 1979, but was closed in 1991. During the 1967 Tasmanian bushfires the town of Snug was devastated, two-thirds of the town s houses were destroyed, along with two churches and half the school. Snug is home to the Channel Folk Museum.
Snug Tiers is a Nature Recreational Area 8.7 km west of Margate. Walking tracks lead to a number of waterfalls, including the popular Snug Falls. The return track gradually descends through bushland to the cool, fern lined gully beneath delightful Snug Falls. Keep a look out for native orchids during spring and summer. In winter, eastern spinebills frequent the area, feeding on the pink and white flowering heath. The sweet nectar of silver banksia flowers attract crescent and yellow throated honeyeaters, and green rosellas. You might also see strong-billed honeyeaters hopping their way up eucalypt trunks, picking at insects. Once down on the valley floor, look for the beautiful pink robin which feeds amongst the leaf litter of wet forests. The falls are particularly impressive after heavy rain, and in summer, it’s a great place to paddle in the shallows on a warm day.
Coningham Beach on the southern shore of Snug Bay is one of Tasmania's most sheltered, offering year-round swimming and is suitable for paddling, boating and picnicking. The 500 m long beach faces northeast across the bay entrance and receives waves averaging up to 0.5 metres, which maintain a reflective to occasionally low tide terrace beach. Channel Highway leads south to Kettering. Little Coningham Beach occupies the next small embayment 200 metres to the east and is a curving 200 metre long reflective beach, with boats moored off the beach. A few boat sheds and dinghies line the beach.
From the white sands of Coningham Beach take a bushwalk along the cliffs with spectacular view across North West Bay to kunanyi / Mount Wellington, Tinderbox and Bruny Island. Along the way you will often see white-bellied sea-eagles soaring overhead. During morning and evening walks the bush will ring with birdsong. Rustic wooden seats give an excuse for a pause to soak up the peace and the scenery. Halfway along you will come to Legacy Beach, a great place for children to play and to stop for a cuppa.
D'Entrecasteaux Channel, Gordon
D'Entrecasteaux Channel
One of the most memorable routes from Hobart to the Huon Valley is Channel Highway, the coast road alongside D'Entrecasteaux Channel through Taroona, where the world's oldest round shot tower stands. Further on, there are superb sea views of Storm Bay and Bruny Island beyond. Travelling south, on the shores of the Channel are Kingston, Margate, Snug and then Kettering.
The sheltered Channel, which separates the Tasmanian mainland south of Hobart from Bruny Island, was named eponymously by the French explorer Bruni D'Entrecasteaux in 1792. The channel became important for shipping between Hobart and the coastal bases of whalers, sealers and timber-getters further south.
The far northern section of the channel between the mainland of south east Tasmania and the northern tip of Bruny Island is known as North West Bay. The larger bay to the south of it, between Woodbridge and Gordon, is called Great Bay. Though these two bays are treated as part of D'Entrecasteaux Channel, in reality the channel begins where the huon River estuary flows into it in near Verona Sands.
D'Entrecasteaux Channel was first sighted by Dutch navigator Abel Tasman in 1642 and later visited by British explorers Furneaux, Cook, Bligh and Cox between 1770 and 1790. The majority of names in and around the channel recall the visit of a French expedition to the area in February 1793. The Huon River is named after Captain Huon de Kermadec, commander of one of the expedition ships - L'Esperance.
Brief History
Being an area abounding in swan and other bird life, North West Bay was home to a band of Aborigines, apparently war-like. According to James Kelly, before 1819 North West Bay (and the banks of the Huon) were occupied by ‘natives’ until driven off onto Bruni Island.
In the first 5 years of settlement, North West Bay was a favoured location for settlement hunting parties, a fact born out by the letters of surveyor GP Harris, and the diary of Rev Robert Knopwood. Although not documented, the intrusion by Europeans into traditional hunting ground of the indigenous people, inevitably lead to a fatal clash of cultures.
Botanist Robert Brown was perhaps the first post-settlement European to venture down the North West Bay River – even if accidentally. Attempting to find a route from the face of Mt Wellington to the Huon River, Brown had traced down a stream, only to arrive at North West Bay. In May 1804, he and mineralogist Adolarius William Henry Humphrey finally found a route to the Huon River, tried to find its source, and returned exhausted through the bush to North West Bay.
One of the first group of settlers to visit North West Bay was a survey party led by GP Harris in November 1804 aboard the whaler Alexander. He was accompanied by Rev Knopwood and several assigned servants in the boat crew – Henry Hakin the pilot (Aitken?), the Government coxswain, plus Joseph Powell, ? Garret, William Richardson, ? Davis, William Atkinson, George Scholer, William Russell, Henry Miller and (Thomas) Salmon. Knopwood described the expedition in some detail. The ship headed down Storm Passage and came to anchor at ‘North Cove’.
The first settlers at North West Bay were marines from the First Fleet Regiment and the NSW Corps, the so-called Rum Corps. This is borne out by a list of 11 men who obtained grants in the Kingborough district in 1820, the majority of whom were Marines. These grants are further substantiated by a map dated 1814, and signed by Governor Lachlan Macquarie. The Marine settlers were given land grants along the bays of what became Kingborough, starting with Thomas Lucas and John Foley (or Folly) at Brown’s River, then another at Blackman’s Bay, followed by others at North West Bay, including James Clysold (or Clissold).
The Marines settling at Kingborough, perhaps due to the variable soil and rainfall, found themselves in difficulties and requested that their grants be transferred elsewhere. One Marine who stayed was Pte John Folley, a First Fleeter and a stonemason and carpenter, who arrived on the Friendship in 1788. Posted to Norfolk Island, in 1793 Folley (or Foley) married former Lady Juliana convict, Catherine Heyland. Removed to Van Diemen’s Land in 1808 on the Porpoise, he was accompanied by his wife, two sons and servants Samuel Columbine and Thomas Kenton (who also later was granted land at Blackman’s Bay in 1820). In May 1819, John Foley, based at Blackman’s Bay, was appointed Constable for North West Bay and Brown’s River.
Three other First Fleet marines who were given grants at North West Bay were John Downs, Thomas Terrett/ and John Whaley/Wailie. Little is known about the first two soldiers, who arrived as Marines with Whaley on the Calcutta. However, not all the North West Bay settlers were Marines. One of the non-Marines who received a grant at North West Bay was John Pearsall, who was probably selected for his trade as a blacksmith. He was a 24 year old nailer when convicted at the Staffordshire Assizes in 1801, for stealing ‘with others,’ a bull calf, two tame cocks, six tame hens and two cheeses.’ Initially sentenced to death, he was transported instead. Pardoned in 1813, he received the grant at North West Bay the following year.
The second generation of Lucases – John, Richard and Nathaniel – later owned large areas of land around the North West Bay River and the future site of Margate. John Lucas married Sophia Sherburd in 1824, the daughter of former Norfolk Island settlers. John Lucas also owned a large tract of land at Margate south of the river, from the main road to the water front. Here, a collection of buildings is situated where the Margate Creek meets the saline estuary.
John’s brother, Richard Lucas, owned a tract of land inland and adjoining another brother, Nathaniel Lucas. (Richard Lucas married Elizabeth Green, nee Fawkner, the widowed daughter of Calcutta convict, John Fawkner, and his wife Hannah. Fawkner was later to become a co-founder of Melbourne.)
Nathaniel Lucas’ large tract of land ran from North West Bay River in the north, southward crossing Margate Rivulet. (He had married Elizabeth Fisher, the daughter of another Norfolk Island settler, Edward Fisher, whose grant covered lower Sandy Bay where the name is recalled in ‘Fisher Avenue’.)
History notes: Peter MacFie, Historian. A History of North West Bay and Margate, Tasmania 1792 – 2000.