Lake St. Clair is a long finger-shaped lake smack in the middle of Tasmania. Like a hitchhiker’s thumb, really. On that lake, a short pier leads to an old hydroelectric power station. What was once a functioning pumphouse is now a rentable cabin called, appropriately enough, Pumphouse Point.
And can you imagine a better place to spend a 14-day quarantine?
The pumphouse lies near the borders of three national parks: Crater Mountain-Lake St. Clair; Walls of Jerusalem; and Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers. The pier extends 820 feet into the lake, which means over the water views for each room in the pumphouse’s three levels. You’d feel like you were floating above the water because, effectively, you would be.
A lounge at the bottom floor has a wood-burning fireplace and a small bar. Want to kick back and watch nature roar over the lake on a fierce winter’s day? Yeah, so do we.
There’s world-class fly fishing just outside, by the way. Hiking, trail running, mountain biking too.
Along the shore there are a few other rentable rooms, and a restaurant, but psshh, there are more people there. The pumphouse’s bar is on-your-honor, and each room has a stocked larder. If you need to self-isolate for whatever reason, you could do much worse than the middle of a lake in remote Tasmania. You could hardly do better in fact.
Weekend Cabin isn’t necessarily about the weekend, or cabins. It’s about the longing for a sense of place, for shelter set in a landscape…for something that speaks to refuge and distance from the everyday. Nostalgic and wistful, it’s about how people create structure in ways to consider the earth and sky and their place in them. It’s not concerned with ownership or real estate, but what people build to fulfill their dreams of escape. The very time-shortened notion of “weekend” reminds that it’s a temporary respite.
Dear outdoor friends,
The planet does not need you to be traveling around the world to exotic
places. Find your connection with nature locally and reduce your carbon footprint. I like AJ but this type of travel promotion is exactly what we do not need now to try to slow the warming of the planet.
We certainly appreciate the sentiment, but we have a fair amount of readers in Australia for whom this isn’t an international trip. It’s also the case that Weekend Cabin is very much about a longing and imagining, not necessarily a promotion to travel to a specific place.
Well said that man. I thoroughly enjoy the articles even if I may never get the opportunity to visit the locations shown. I find the content inspirational and moving. I live vicariously through the stories, and thus keep my own carbon footprint to a minimum. Keep up the great work!
AJ Editors, please continue to include articles such as this one about wonderful places for adventure around the world. As world citizens, people have a responsibility to be aware and take actions regarding climate change. We should. And many do. But subscribing to a new puritan ethic is not required. The world is ours to experience and enjoy. Travel for family, friends, and adventure contribute to living vital, active lives. It’s probably a very, very small percentage of AJ readers who will hop on a plane to Tasmania after reading this article. And those that do are folks who likely already do international travel regardless of this article. But I, for one, am enriched to know of this beautiful place. Keep bringing us stories that contribute to us living vital, active, adventurous lives!
What we really need are some weekend cabins from the east coast.
Keep them coming! I love the cabin articles – and I’ve never been to a single one (other than in daydreams) so no carbon footprint expansion for me!
Well…. there is always a negative response….. poor soul,, probably fretting about climate change…. perhaps a relaxing weekend in a beautiful, wonderful corner of God’s beautiful earth, will free his soul from the constraints he selfishly hoards!