A Guide to see Wineglass Bay Beach - One of the top ten beaches in the world
Saturday, August 14, 2021
After the most relaxing day and night spent in Bay of Fires, we were ready to get active on day two of our trip and Freycinet National Park was just the place for it.
Freycinet is a short two-hour drive from the Bay of Fires and you can opt to drive at night after spending time at Bay of Fires as well. But given the Bush Retreat in Bay of Fires was a must for us and the fact that night driving in Tasmania leads to a lot of unavoidable roadkill -- we decided to schedule this for the next day.
A two-hour drive is nothing for us Sydneysiders, and instead of wasting time checking in, we headed straight to the National park. It's also only 2.5 hours from Launceston as well, so you can also choose to skip Bay of Fires and head straight here, depending on your interests.
Home to white sandy beaches, azure water, secluded bays and the Hazard mountain ranges, Freycinet is a nature lover's paradise. And at the heart of it all sits Wineglass Bay. There are other things to do such as Oyster Farm tours, but we were here exclusively for the picturesque Wineglass Bay.
There are 3 ways to see Wineglass Bay: Hike to Wineglass Bay Lookout, head further down to Wineglass beach or hike up Mt Amos for a 360 degree view of Wineglass Bay. We opted for the first and second combined option. Here's how it went:
Wineglass Bay Look Hike - From the car park, Wineglass Bay lookout is a moderate 45 minute (1.5km) hike, one way. It's a well formed and popular track with a consistent incline and some stairs. Its suitable for most fitness types but the steep incline may have you out of breath sooner than you expect if its sunny. The view from the lookout is quite nice although it doesn't seem to beat the 360 view from Mount Amos. This is why I highly recommend you hike down to Wineglass Beach, an extra 45 minutes (1.5kms) one way.
Wineglass Bay Beach - The hike to the beach is basically going down a thousand (no exaggeration) stairs at a very steep incline. But don't worry, you'll come across flat sections as well at timely intervals to let you catch your breath. According to the national park guidelines, this stretch is a lot more strenuous than the trail up to the lookout but for some odd reason, we found it the opposite. Perhaps the the promise of turquoise waters of Wineglass Beach, one of the top 10 beaches in the world, is what kept us motivated. Or perhaps the slight disappointment of the lookout kept us searching for more instead of returning to our car like most of the visitors.
The beach was awe inducing. It's quite long, stretching for 6kms and due to the difficulty of reaching here, we were only accompanied by 2 other groups of people on this vast stretch of untouched natural beauty. The white and pristine sand was nothing like anything I've seen before but I would warn everyone to wear their sunglasses when heading here. The white sand on a sunny day makes for a very reflective scene that can be super harsh on the eyes.
Another tip would be to pack a towel and some swimmers, or atleast a towel. Chances are you'll be so hot from the walk even in autumn that you'll be willing to jump in the water, and trust me, the water will be tempting. Being alone also means that you can walk further up to find a quieter corner and just strip to your underwear if you didn't bring swimmers.
From here, you can walk the entirety of the beach and then continue another 1.4KM on a flat and wildlife-filled track to Hazards Beach. But this track was closed on the day of our visit, so we headed back up the thousand stairs, this time climbing instead of descending making the whole trip a three hour slog.
Was it worth it? Yes! I imagine Mt Amos gets the raving reviews for a reason, and we were a little sad that we didn't have time to do Mt Amos as well but we were plenty satisfied with our way of getting familiar with Wineglass Bay.
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