STRAHAN:

A picturesque village on the shores of the isolated Macquarie Harbour on the west coast. The area has a colourful history that includes ancient Aboriginal habitation and, since European settlement, logging and fishing. Local history is told in text and displays at the excellent Strahan Wharf Centre, and on most days the Round Earth Theatre Company presents a play that tells the story of Sarah Island in Macquarie Harbour, where in the 1800s transported convicts worked timber, built boats and endured terrible conditions.

The village is surrounded by wilderness. You can walk there or on the beach, or take a cruise on the harbour or up the splendid Gordon River, or a ride on a jet boat. The sunsets are dramatic. In January 1999 the travel editor of ’The Chicago Tribune’, an American newspaper, named Strahan as ’The Best Little Town in the World’.