Woolnorth Tour

 We prebooked our tour with Laura from Woolnorth Tours because we heard it was popular. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't ideal, but we set off from Stanley to drive one hour to the pickup point and hop aboard her mini-bus, which would take us through several locked gates.

The Woolnorth property was initially owned by the Van Diemens Land Company in 1826. Its chief Agent, Edward Curr, was responsible for the company and started the construction of Highfield House, which overlooks Godfreys Beach and the Nut at Stanley. George IV initially granted the company 350,000 acres.

The $90 per person tour is the only way to access the Northwest Cape and Cape Grim.

The tour also allowed us to visit the Bluff Point and Studland Bay wind farms. The more than forty staff members who work permanently on-site to keep the turbines in working order have given Laura a wealth of knowledge about their operation. This work includes cleaning the blades, removing rust from the towers, and repairing or replacing the motors that the blades are attached to. 

Morning tea was served in the shearing shed, which is no longer used. It was surrounded by quad bikes in the paddock, which were no longer used.

Matthew Flinders named Cape Grim, the two small islands called the Doughboys, and the wild and untamed part of Tasmania in 1798. Laura discusses the cape's Indigenous history and the subsequent massacre of Aboriginals there.

Laura also explained the operation of the Cape Grim Baseline Air Pollution Station, which monitors and records uncontaminated air from across the Southern Ocean. The nearest landmass is 19,800 km away at Cape Horn, on the tip of South America. There are only three of these premier stations in the world: this one at Cape Grim, Mauna Loa in Hawaii and Alert in the Canadian Arctic. Cape Grim constantly has the cleanest air, thanks to the fewer land masses in the south.