Competitors could see it from afar, this metallic lighthouse which marks the approach to the port of Hobart in Tasmania. By passing this latitude, the competitors are leaving the Indian Ocean to enter the Pacific. However, this geographical change is not likely to change their daily sailing routine much.
I could have told you here about the discovery of this island by Abel Tasman in 1642, this Dutchman in the service of the very famous VOC, Dutch East India Company, who left from present Jakarta to explore Australia. Circumventing this continent by the South with two small ships, from November 24 to December 3, 1642, he sailed along the southern coast of what he did not know to be an island. There they managed to get time to plant a flag to take possession of it before continuing their journey eastward.
Or tell you about the last voyage of the French navigator Marion-Dufresne, who made a passage very close to the site of this lighthouse when he entered Frederick Henry Bay on March 3, 1772. To tell you that he too, like Abel Tasman, had the impression of an inhospitable land and, lacking water and wood to repair it, he set out again towards New Zealand and his destiny.
Tell you about this last inhabited lighthouse to be built in Tasmania. Decided in 1885, construction did not begin until 1903. The transport of materials to this islet extending Cape Pillar had required heavy work, and its initial cost of £10,000 had finally reached £22,000, a considerable sum for the time.
No, if I really had more room, I would have liked to mention this sometimes controversial actor, Errol Flynn and his interpretation of a privateer captain in Michael Curtis' film "The Sea Hawk", since he is a native of Hobart. Rain check?
