Recherche Bay

Recherche Bay

This area is a World Heritage Site and the sign at the entrance to the state park here reads: "A ring of wild water circles the southern extremity of the Earth. Surrounding the world's largest continent, Antarctica, the South Ocean forms an almost unbroken band between latitudes 40-60 degrees south. Only three fingers of land poke into this barrier--Tasmania's southern coast, the southern part of New Zealand's south island, and Tierra del Fuego, on the tip of South America. The spin of the Earth generates prevailing winds which drive ocean currents. In these latitudes, the westerly winds that blow unobstructed around the South Ocean have well earned their dramatic names--the Roaring Forties, the Furious Fifties and the Screaming Sixties. It was these constant winds that filled the sails of the small wooden ships of Abel Tasman, James Cook and Bruni d' Entrecasteaux. Looking into the eye of the wind from any point on the coast of Tasmania, the next land to the west is Argentina, 12,000 kilometers away, and to the south, is Antarctica, 2,500 kilometers away, as an albatross flies."