As we hit the highway the weather seemed to be following us, and we opted for a slight change of route since we'd been driving through drizzle that wasn't doing any favours to the views I'd hypothesized the day before. Given the opportunity to turn left and cross the Derwent, that's what we did, and with the weather behind us and rolling along our right hand flank we were rewarded with excellent views across the Derwent estuary. Not quite as magnificent as what we'd enjoyed on the west bank of the Tamar nearly six years earlier. That time we'd been right down low, with the road running right alongside the western bank of the stream. Here we were higher, with vistas encompassing the landscape rather than river level views across the stream. The vistas continued beyond the trans-Derwent section of New Norfolk, and as the river widened the views became more sweeping as we approached the previously undiscovered Bridgewater, which turned out to be a smallish settlement skirted by the highway we turned onto.
The new route swept us around Richmond, looping through Tea Tree Road (rather than Middle Tea Tree or Back Tea Tree), onto Colebrook with a left hand turn into Fingerpost Road, which in turn deposited us on the Tasman Highway just before the first of several steep winding sections of road. These eventually delivered us, via Buckland, to the coast at Orford, the community at the mouth of the Prosser River.
Orford dates back to 1825 and a settlement that served a dual purpose, part whaling station, part garrison and mainland port supporting the convict settlement at Darlington on Maria Island. The town took its name from Edward Walpole, who was granted 1,000 acres in the vicinity in 1831.
He named his property Strawberry Hill, after the London residence of his relative Horace Walpole, the Third Earl of Orford. A quarry situated between Orford and Spring Beach, south of the township, provided hand-hewn sandstone for use in buildings in Hobart and Melbourne, including the Melbourne General Post Office.
Orford is the kind of picturesque coastal locality with built in photographer appeal, and once we were over the bridge The Photographer was looking for somewhere we could park that would also deliver interesting views of the river and marina. There was nothing obvious there, so we looped back across the river around to the tourist information site on the side of the road. Apart from what was probably a comprehensive listing of local businesses there was no joy there for The Photographer, though the listing reminded me there was a winery in the vicinity.