The Best Things to Do in Deloraine, Tasmania’s Tiny Weekend MVP

Deloraine has spent the past two years winning Tasmania’s Small Tourism Town title and behaving as though nobody told it. The Meander River still slips through the middle of town, platypuses still surface around dusk, and mornings still have a way of being lost to coffee windows, bakery counters, old pubs and whatever is happening inside the local florist. Beyond the main street, the Great Western Tiers rise blue and enormous, with truffle dogs working the red earth, cellar doors hidden down country roads, waterfalls buried in ferny forest and farm gates capable of wrecking any sensible plan to travel light.

This is the charm of Deloraine: there is far more here than its size has any right to suggest. Come for two nights. Leave wondering why you didn’t book three.

Best Places to Eat and Drink in Deloraine

Sailor’s Nook

It started with an old blue Mercedes school bus found on King Island and a menu of battered Tassie seafood. Years later, Sailor still roams the north, but Sailor’s Nook has given Deloraine a permanent taste of the action. Order coffee through the town’s only coffee window, then breakfast burgers and loaded potato gems in the morning or a bowl of creamy seafood chowder once lunch calls.

57 Emu Bay Road, Deloraine

41° South Tasmania & Georgie’s Cafe

Eight kilometres out of Deloraine, lunch comes with several thousand salmon and a waterfall. 41° South Tasmania & Georgie’s Cafe raises salmon in freshwater tanks threaded through a natural wetland system, then hot-smokes the fish for plates at Georgie’s and jars of rillettes to take home. Wander the farm afterwards through ginseng beds, wetlands and along the Western Rivulet, with Montana Falls waiting further along the track. Lunch, fish farm, forest walk: somehow it all makes complete sense here.

323 Montana Road, Red Hills

Found in Earth

Flowers have a habit of spilling into everything at Found in Earth. Bouquets and branches crowd the florist benches while Gioconda coffee runs through the espresso machine, with slices and sweet things waiting nearby. Then there are the shelves: Tasmanian wine, chocolate, ceramics, jewellery, plants and curious little gifts mixed in among all that foliage. The floristry is the serious business here, but stopping for coffee in the middle of it all is rather lovely too.

29 West Church Street, Deloraine

The Garden

Across from the river, The Garden keeps things wonderfully small: Ritual Coffee Roasters through the machine, a cabinet of sweet treats and handmade ceramics by local artist Dean Kasper lined up nearby. Take your cup outside to the grass beside the Deloraine Train Park, with the Meander River just beyond.

5–7 West Parade, Deloraine

Frank & Lotti

Frank & Lotti has the slightly eccentric warmth of a country cafe that knows exactly what it’s good at. Inside its restored 1800s building, Tasmanian produce moves through seasonal breakfast and lunch plates while the counter heaves with sourdough, Portuguese tarts, lemon-curd friands and whatever cake has won the morning. Coffee is taken seriously, fresh flowers and local produce come home with regulars, and the salted caramel macadamia cheesecake has a habit of derailing plans to order something small.

116 Emu Bay Road, Deloraine

Christmas Hills Raspberry Farm

At Christmas Hills Raspberry Farm Cafe, raspberries refuse to stay in the dessert section. They turn up in the hollandaise on eggs Benedict, the smoky BBQ sauce on slow-cooked beef, the butter beside warm croissants and, naturally, plenty of cake. The working farm sits beside a lily-dotted lake in Elizabeth Town, with gardens and walking paths making lunch easy to stretch out. Buy a jar of raspberry jam on the way through and consider breakfast sorted for tomorrow.

Sitchu Tip: Cross the road to Van Diemens Land Creamery, founded by a Tasmanian dairy farming family, for scoops made with local milk and flavours that currently run from raspberry and lemon curd to whisky and lavender.

9 Christmas Hills Road, Elizabeth Town

Bush Inn Brewhouse

Beer has become a family affair at Bush Inn Brewhouse. The 1848 pub has belonged to the Sheehans since 1986; these days, son Mike and partner Belinda brew small batches in one of its oldest rooms, including a wonderfully Tasmanian Truffle Hound Stout made with local truffles. Sourdough pizzas remain a fixture, now joined by a new Asian-fusion chapter from the kitchen. Settle beside the old brickwork with a tasting paddle, or take things outside to the garden when Deloraine turns warm.

Sitchu Tip: Not a beer drinker? There’s loads of local wines on the list, and the bar team gets creative with cocktails and other seasonal concoctions, like hot gin punch in winter and an orange sorbet gin fizz in summer.

7-9 Meander Valley Road, Deloraine

Meander Valley Vineyard

Meander Valley Vineyard has one particularly good party trick: Baco Noir. Its tiny two-hectare vineyard grows what the estate says is Australia’s only example of the cold-hardy French-American grape, with the current bottling running through mulberry, dark cherry and truffle. Taste it at the revamped cellar door, then settle in with a wood-fired pizza or build-your-own platter of Tasmanian cheese, charcuterie and salmon rillettes. Vines stretch towards the Great Western Tiers outside; another glass tends to make sense.

46 Montana Road, Red Hills

The British Hotel

Deloraine’s top pub has been pouring drinks since 1859; these days, some of the beer travels only a few metres. The British Hotel is home to Little Green Men Brewing Co., making small-batch sours, wheat beers, IPAs and porters on site, plus real ale straight from the hand pump. Order a tasting paddle, claim a table among the locals and let the bistro handle dinner. There’s a pool table nearby if one pint becomes several.

80 Emu Bay Road, Deloraine

Best Places to Stay in Deloraine and Surrounds

Cedar Cottage Meander

Cedar Cottage Meander has family history in its joints. Owner Sarah Williams’s grandfather hand-built the shingled cottage in 1986, with Tasmanian myrtle and Huon pine still running through the interiors today. Pick herbs and vegetables from the kitchen garden, cook dinner over the fire pit or put the excellent chef’s kitchen to work with local milk, butter, coffee and homemade jam. By dusk, take a glass to the cedar hot tub and watch the Great Western Tiers turn blue beyond the deck.

58 Sherriffs Road, Meander

Hibiki Haus

Twenty minutes from Deloraine, Hibiki Haus sits beside a pond with 50 acres of forest behind it and not much else in sight. The handcrafted cabin pairs stone, timber and Belgian linen with a wood burner, deep double shower and a window seat made for watching weather move through the trees. Outside, a wood-fired hot tub waits among Japanese maples, bluebells and cherry blossom, while walking paths disappear into the garden and bush beyond. Come December, the laburnum walk turns yellow overhead.

Liffey, Tasmania

Wandering Trout – Gourmet Stays

Six rooms, one table, 12 seats. Wandering Trout has turned an old Mole Creek house into the kind of dinner party you travel for. Everyone gathers around the Hosts’ Table for a seasonal chef’s menu that roams freely across cuisines, accompanied by small-producer wines, guided pairings and vinyl spinning nearby. Plates change with what’s good; recent iterations have moved from kingfish ceviche and slow-braised pork belly to mushroom tagliatelle. Then comes the clever bit: your bed is upstairs.

100 Pioneer Drive, Mole Creek

Meander Valley Vineyard

Sleeping among the vines has become quite the proposition at Meander Valley Vineyard. Vintners Rest is the original hideaway, with a king bed, heated bathroom and a sunken bathtub cut into the timber deck, best occupied with a glass of Pinot Noir as the rows disappear into dusk. Newer arrivals Barrel and Bloom trade walls for canvas, each with a private deck and wood-fired hot tub handmade from Tasmanian Celery Top Pine. In the morning, the vineyard is right there; by lunch, so are cellar-door tastings, local produce platters and wood-fired pizza.

46 Montana Road, Red Hills

Naivasha Escapes

Naivasha Escapes is really two different Tasmanian weekends sharing one Reedy Marsh address. The century-old Cottage sleeps six beneath a roof of timber and stone, with lake-facing windows, a wood fire, chooks supplying breakfast eggs and an antique claw-foot bath sitting out beneath the sky. For two, disappear further into the bush at the cedar Tiny House, built by local craftspeople with a loft bedroom, enormous picture windows and another claw-foot bath inside. Outside, the wood-fired hot tub steams among the trees. Phone reception disappears; Wi-Fi, mercifully, does not.

210 Wadleys Road, Reedy Marsh

The Eco Cabin 

The Eco Cabin manages the neat trick of feeling removed from town while sitting right in the middle of it. The sharp little A-frame rises behind century-old hawthorn and dry-stone walls, with upcycled Tasmanian oak underfoot, a salvaged spiral staircase curling towards the loft bedroom and a pellet fire downstairs. Out on the deck, sink into the cedar hot tub as weather rolls across Quamby Bluff and the Great Western Tiers. There’s local sloe gin waiting inside and bicycles for wandering Deloraine the next morning.

6 Tower Hill Street, Deloraine

The Milkman’s Shack

The name undersells it. The Milkman’s Shack is a tiny Dunorlan farm stay built for two, with timber floors, a moody little bedroom and doors opening straight onto paddocks dotted with cattle. Resident ducks potter around the property, there’s an orchard to wander through and the deck catches the long country light beautifully. Best of all is the freestanding outdoor bath: run it after dark, climb in and watch the Milky Way appear above the fields. Very little required beyond wine and somewhere to put the book.

1123 Weegena Road, Dunorlan

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Forest Hall

There are old houses, and then there is Forest Hall, a convict-built Georgian beauty dating to around 1845, ten minutes from Deloraine. Inside, a curling cedar staircase leads past high ceilings, thick stone walls and a library, while the kitchen still carries its original bread oven beside a working Aga. Outside is even better: nine acres of established gardens planted with ancient oaks, a crab-apple walk, daffodil paddocks and more than 300 varieties of roses. Three bedrooms make it one for the group chat.

Elizabeth Town

Best Things to Do in Deloraine: Walks, Wildlife & Outdoor Adventures

Deloraine Market

First Saturday mornings belong to Deloraine Market, when the showgrounds turn into a very Deloraine jumble of fresh produce, seedlings, home baking, preserves, second-hand books, handmade wares and tables of bric-a-brac. It is less glossy farmers’ market, more weekly-life-with-the-doors-open, with locals catching up over something hot from the market cafe beneath the Great Western Tiers. It runs 9am–1pm, skipping January and November, with an extra Christmas edition in December.

Highland Lakes Road, Deloraine

Melita Honey Farm

Fifteen minutes from Deloraine, Melita Honey Farm is a small shrine to everything bees make brilliant. Work through the free honey tastings, from floral Leatherwood to darker bush varieties, then peer into the glass-fronted hive and watch worker bees at close range. The house specialty is Leatherwood honey ice cream, churned in Chudleigh with Tasmanian milk and cream and served in 12 flavours. There’s handmade honey nougat too, and as of 2026, coffee and indoor seating have joined the mix.

39 Sorell Street, Chudleigh

Tulampanga / Alum Cliffs

Twenty minutes from Deloraine, a 1.6-kilometre track climbs through dry forest before the land drops away into the Mersey River Gorge, some 200 metres below. Tulampanga / Alum Cliffs is the Pallittorre name for this culturally significant part of the Gog Range, an area rich in ochre. Near the plateau, a three-point sculpture marks traditional travel routes between Western Bluff, tulampanga and Quamby Bluff; beyond it, the river threads between steep forested walls. Forty minutes, very little effort, enormous reward.

Alum Cliffs Track, Mole Creek

Ashgrove Dairy Door

A wall of glass is all that separates lunch from the cheesemakers responsible for it at Ashgrove Cheese Dairy Door. The Bennett family has farmed around Elizabeth Town since the 1880s, and weekdays still bring wheels of cheese taking shape on site. Settle in for truffle fondue, one of five stacked toasties or the brilliantly excessive High Cheese, then hunt down Walls of Jerusalem Wild Wasabi, crowned Champion Dairy at the 2026 DIAA Awards. Gelato for the road; esky space strongly advised.

6173 Bass Highway, Elizabeth Town

Deloraine River Walk

The Meander River slips straight through the middle of Deloraine, and this easy 30-minute circuit catches the town at its loveliest. Cross two old suspension bridges, pass the heritage train and weir, then follow sculptures scattered along the grassy banks. Part of the route joins the kooparoona niara Cultural Trail, with bush-food plantings, artworks and a stone yarning circle beneath the Great Western Tiers. Come back around dusk, when the river goes glassy and the local platypus families begin surfacing: a ripple beneath the reeds, a small brown back breaking the water, then gone again before everyone beside you has worked out what they’ve seen.

Follow the Water

Deloraine sits beneath the Great Western Tiers, which means waterfalls have a habit of appearing in almost every direction. Start with Liffey Falls, a 45-minute forest walk passing Alexandra, Hopetoun and Albert Falls before the river tumbles over the final sandstone ledges. Ten minutes from town, Montana Falls is the easy little detour, reached through eucalypt, banksia and blackwood forest and especially good after winter rain. Pair it with lunch at nearby 41° South.

For a longer wander, Westmorland Falls takes around two hours through ferny forest in Mole Creek Karst National Park, while the walk from Lemonthyme Lodge collects Bridal Veil, Champagne and No Name Falls in one 2.5-hour loop. Serious boots can be pointed towards Parsons Falls or the magnificent Meander Falls, a steep 10-kilometre day walk through rainforest to a two-tiered fall dropping through the Great Western Tiers.

Art, Silk and Serious Craft

Deloraine’s crafty reputation becomes much easier to understand standing in front of Yarns Artwork in Silk. More than 300 local makers spent around 10,000 hours turning 200 metres of hand-dyed silk into four enormous panels, one for each season, stitched with farm fences, caves, rivers, townsfolk and the Great Western Tiers. It is gloriously detailed, slightly eccentric and very Deloraine.

Then take it outside. Sculptures by local artists line the Meander River, alongside the kooparoona niara Cultural Trail, created from an idea by local Aboriginal man Greg Murray and threaded with native plantings, bush foods, artworks and a stone yarning circle. And each spring, the town goes all in for the Tasmanian Craft Fair, Australia’s largest working display of arts and crafts, spreading makers across Deloraine for three very busy days.

The Truffle Farm Tasmania

Australia’s truffle story has a very literal starting point: the red earth outside Deloraine. In 1999, Tim Terry dug up the country’s first black truffle here; today his daughter Anna leads visitors between the oak trees with a pack of highly trained noses. Follow the dogs, get your hands into the soil and, during harvest season, you may unearth one yourself. Afterwards comes fresh truffle shaved over a three-cheese sourdough toastie, Tasmanian wine and truffle ice cream. Dirt under the nails, truffle on lunch. An excellent trade.

844 Mole Creek Road, Deloraine

Trowunna Wildlife Sanctuary

At Trowunna Wildlife Sanctuary, kangaroos drift between the trees, wombats barrel in with surprising purpose and Tasmanian devils turn feeding time into a noisy little spectacle. Daily keeper-led tours move through the 70-acre sanctuary, bringing visitors close to some of the island’s most remarkable native animals while unpacking the breeding, rehabilitation and release work happening behind the scenes. Quolls, potoroos, pademelons and native birds appear along the way, but the wombats tend to leave with the fan club.

1892 Mole Creek Road, Mole Creek

Frequently Asked Questions

Now that you’re all set for a delightful adventure in Deloraine, why not extend your journey into Tasmania’s wild and rugged beauty? We’ve handpicked the finest national parks and most beautiful walks to make your experience truly unforgettable.