Terra Tasmania: East coast For Sale

We then drove north along the coast. First the narrow paved road ran out, then a potholed dirt track petered away, then we parked and took a sandy walking path until even that was swallowed by beach rocks quickly covered by the incoming sea.

And there, at the end of all the tracks, we spied a long battered farmhouse guarding the Tasman along this Bay of Fires Coast.

At night, from the sea, you would be able to see the isolated lights the farmer burns in exactly the same way Captain Tobias Furneax could see lights from aboriginal fires dotting this very coastline when he sailed passed in 1773, with one eye on the rocks, one on the shore.

But there are no aboriginals here now.

A few black cows munch in one or two paddocks on tufted grass. There are more pelicans than people. It looks salt sprayed and crisp -- hard to imagine it is rich or fertile terrain.

Not far from here, we spy three council workers clearing a small clump of exotic shrubs from the seashore, planted by birds lifted from a nearby property where it grows freely. The workers have a stretch of this north east coast they are responsible for. They carry their pruning and prising tools and scour the coast from north to south, then start all over again. Like painting the Sydney Harbour bridge.

It is lonely, remote -- and utterly lovely in its remoteness.

There are no real towns, so virtually no facilities. Just fishing shacks hugging the coast wherever they can. Most of these are posted with 'For Sale' signs. Most are tiny: one bedroom at best, or maybe two very tiny ones. A few, around The Gardens are new, even architect designed. But most by any name are shanties, cabins, shacks, fisherman's huts, bought by Queenslanders and New South Welshmen we are informed, who, on a romanticised trip along the coast, thought they might visit a lot, bought themselves a cabin to do just that, then came too rarely to make it work for them. Or for the area.

So now most are for sale and look as though they need a facelift.

The trouble is that given the lack of real folk in these coastal places for most of the year means that what villages, even St Marys tucked up in the chill of Elephant's Pass interior, are suffering. For most of the year no one is occupying these second homes, so little places that try to stay open by selling plastic buckets, ice-cream, coffee, lunches, or even crayfish in season, are visibly struggling.

Roads along the coast are narrow and potholed, shacks mostly for sale, an occasional village shop is open, at least while we are here on these chilled summer days, attempting a brave face at best.

A few summer tourists are still turning up to walk the walks, eat the pancakes, buy the fresh oysters at $13.00 a dozen and local blueberries at $4.00 a punnet, and, because the quota for the summer has now been met, lobster are currently selling for around $99.00 a kilo, or $150 a piece, more expensive than usual, we are told.

But while tourists still roam, some are still sold, even at that price.