Does sitting around a campfire with a torch under your chin, re-telling urban myths, evoke childhood memories? Did you scream at the TV, telling Jill to “get out of the house” whilst watching ‘When a Stranger Calls’ (cult horror classic from 1979, not the 2006 remake)? Are you weirdly drawn to reading headstones in ancient cemeteries? Yep, you. That’s who I’m talking to.
If pushing an upturned shot glass around a home-made Ouija board is a nostalgic recollection, or writing ‘redrum’ on the bathroom mirror to scare your significant other is your idea of fun (mirror steams up, writing revealed, the Shining…it just isn’t funny if I have to explain it), then spooky tourism is for you!
There is a profusion of eerie tourism sites in Australia where you might hang around an antiquated hall hoping for an apparition to appear or stay the night in haunted hotels where spirits of the long departed lurk. One such place is Port Arthur in Tasmania, a ninety-minute drive southeast of Hobart. Originally established as a timber-getting camp in 1830, in 1833 Port Arthur became a punishment station, with over 12,500 convicts serving sentences at what is now a stunning 100-acre UNESCO World Heritage site. Along with the cruelties endured by prisoners, the site is also infamous for the worst mass murder in Australia.
Enroute to Port Arthur, the weather was ominous, stormy, and gloomy; the trees arched dark and menacing over the road just past Eagle Hawk Neck. A harbinger of things to come.
At the designated tour time, everyone was organised into groups, each with a guide who gave interesting commentary at key locations throughout the site. As I listened to our guide, I was momentarily distracted by some architectural brilliance, and turning back to rejoin the group, I noticed my guide no longer had an accent! Somehow, in a split second, I had joined a different group. Weird. It happened repeatedly for the whole hour of the guided tour. I was legit, in the twilight zone!
The next bit of witchery occurred in the commandant’s house. Halfway through our self-guided tour, the electricity went off, and with the entire house cloaked in forbidding darkness, we were all shepherded out by security. The Commandant was like, “not today, peeps!”
Our last creepy encounter was in The Parsonage, said to be the most haunted building at Port Arthur. Hearing muted voices, we searched the whole house for other sightseers but discovered we were the only ones there (cue the X-Files music!)
When darkness falls, Port Arthur hosts lantern-lit ghost tours, where guides tell stories about paranormal activity and spooky tales of anguished spirits who have never left. And just to crank up the mysterious another notch, there is a display box of “returned things,” items visitors have “souvenired” as a memento of Port Arthur. Letters accompanying these items list varying reasons for their return – bad luck had befallen them, job loss, serious health issues, and family tragedies, to name a few. All thought they were jinxed and felt that returning the contraband would lift the curse.
Weird juju aside, Port Arthur is an absolutely compelling snapshot of Australian history, its imposing, elegant architecture, a juxtaposition to the reason for its creation. Do not miss this on your Tassie itinerary.
