Soldiers Beach, Maria Island, Australia

Soldiers Beach is not so far away as the crow flies, from Hobart... or even Melbourne... yet it's a world away. On the inner, western edge of MarIa Island on Tasmania's east coast, there are no roads to this beach, you'll either need to take a boat directly or into Darlington, before a walk of roughly 10km's.

I was a guide with The Maria Island Walk for 3 seasons between 2014-2017, a terrific 4-day hiking trip that explores the island and its incredible isthmus, so I've walked this beach many times. It's a pretty stock standard beach in many ways, beautiful, but by Tasmanian standards, normal. I suppose it may be seasonal or temporary, such as it is with time and tide and all things sandy... but the ebb and flow of waves washing up and down this beach, often creates a series of self perpetuating highs and lows, like corrugations, with water washing into the lows and struggling to breach the highs. In that way, the beach has an unevenness, and yet, it does give it an unusual aesthetic appeal...