"St Helens and the Bay of Fires " a Saint Helens Travel Page by tiabunna

During our midwinter jaunt to the Island State (Tasmania, to you people overseas) we had a short stay at St Helens, in the north-east corner. We’d been there before and it’s one of our favourite spots in Tassie: scenic, quiet, comfortable, and with generally lower rainfall and milder temperatures than most of the State. Even so, it was rainy and overcast for much of our stay and cleared only as we were leaving.

St Helens started in the mid-1800s as a whaling port, but that industry has long since ceased, as has its role as a port for shipping locally mined tin. How times change: today, in season, you might well be able to go whale-watching on one of the many boats based in the harbour!

Gradually, it’s beginning to dawn on the rest of the world what a really great area this is. Being ‘off the beaten path’ has helped, so far, to keep the crowds at bay. But a year or so back, the UK magazine Condé Nast let out the secret and decreed that the adjacent Bay of Fires had the world’s second best beaches. I have now read a news report in the UK Times On Line that the Lonely Planet guide is to list the Bay of Fires as the World’s Number 1 Destination in its annual “Blue List” of the World’s Top 10 Destinations for 2009!

So read all about it here, then when your neighbours or workmates talk about the Bay of Fires and maybe wonder where it is, you can give them the details! LOL