Photo: Colin Chick (CC BY-SA 4.0)
A self-guided audio walking tour of the Port Arthur convict settlement, which held prisoners from 1830 until it closed in 1877. It begins at the Penitentiary, built as a flour mill and granary and converted between 1854 and 1857 into 136 cells, and climbs past the Guard Tower of 1836, the Commandant's House on its promontory, the stable converted for the political prisoner William Smith O'Brien, and the ruined Hospital of 1842. Then the Asylum, built for up to 100 people with mental illness, the Separate Prison of 1852, where men were kept apart about 23 hours a day, the roofless Convict Church and the Parsonage. The last part takes in the Junior Medical Officer's House on Civil Officers' Row, the Memorial Garden for the thirty-five people killed on 28 April 1996, the Dockyards where convicts built 16 large decked ships, the boys' prison at Point Puer, and the Isle of the Dead, where convict graves were mostly left unmarked. Cruise ships anchor in Carnarvon Bay and tender passengers to the site's own jetty.
14 narrations, yours to keep — no subscription, no expiry. Works offline once downloaded, and if it isn’t for you we’ll refund it.
Going somewhere with no signal? Put the guide on your home screen first, then download it from that icon while you are on wi-fi — that way you download once, and it works in airplane mode with no roaming charges. Show me the order →
Every claim in this tour traces back to a named source — excavation records, the heritage authority for the site, and the primary texts themselves. Nothing is copied from other guidebooks, and anything we can't source doesn't make the recording.
Each stop is built from OpenStreetMap · 24 features in this old town (the field-surveyed mapping database behind Apple Maps), Wikidata · 1 cross-referenced entries (peer-reviewed structured records), the heritage authority below, and the primary historical texts where they exist.
Cross-referenced against Modern excavation publications · academic peer-review.
Every sentence is checked against those sources before it is recorded. If a claim can't be traced, it doesn't make the audio.
Every tour is reviewed by a person before it goes on sale. Stop selection, the route and anything ambiguous come back to the editor for a decision, and those questions routinely send a stop back for another accuracy pass. Nothing publishes on a machine’s say-so.
Spot anything inaccurate? Email [email protected] — fixed in the next pass.
Penitentiary, Guard Tower, Commandant's House, Smith O'Brien's Cottage, Hospital.
Asylum, Separate Prison, Convict Church, Parsonage.
Junior Medical Officer's House, Memorial Garden, Dockyards, Point Puer, Isle of the Dead.
A flour mill and granary of 1845, turned into a penitentiary of 136 cells, now a fire-gutted shell of masonry and barred windows.
The Georgian Gothic tower of 1836 that guarded the barracks, built of stone cut and shaped by the convict boys of Point Puer.
The prison of 1852, where convicts were isolated about 23 hours a day, its wings radiating from a central surveillance hall.
A Gothic Revival church never consecrated, built by convicts with stonework and pews made by Point Puer boys, gutted by fire in 1884.
The convict dockyard where 16 large decked ships and about 150 small boats were built, its old dock still visible.
The settlement's graveyard from 1833 to 1877, marked graves for free people on the high ground, unmarked convict graves below.
Tap "Start Walking Tour" and allow location access. The map shows all 14 narration points.
Follow the suggested route or explore freely. GPS tracks your position. Reach a site and the narration plays automatically.
Each site has its own narration. 14 narration points.
Narrations play when you reach each site. No buttons, no track numbers. Walk naturally — the stories find you.
Premium narration that sounds like a documentary. Warm and knowledgeable, not a textbook reading.
Every narration is drafted, cross-checked against primary sources, then passed through a second editorial pass that strips unsupported claims. Dates, names, and citations verified.
See all narration points on the map. Tap any point to hear it early or replay it later.
Every narrated point in Port Arthur — the Convict Settlement on the Tasman Peninsula, each with its own narration.
Spend an hour or a full day. Skip sites, revisit favourites, take breaks. The tour adapts to you.
14 narration points, including Penitentiary, Commandant's House, Hospital, Convict Church and Memorial Garden. That is about 20 minutes of narration in all, and you walk between the stops at your own pace.
Yes. It plays in your phone’s browser as you walk: no guide, no group, no app to install and no fixed start time.
Three ways, all built in:
The map-tap option means you can stand anywhere — even at home before you travel — and play any narration. GPS just makes it hands-free while you’re actually walking the site.
No. Use the “Download for offline” button before you go, and the entire tour — audio, maps, narration text — works without any data connection. Tap-to-play and the map both work fully offline. GPS itself doesn’t need data; only the download does.
Add the icon first, then download from the icon. On iPhone a guide downloaded in Safari cannot be seen by the home screen icon, so downloading first means downloading the whole thing twice.
Putting it on your home screen — iPhone or iPad (Safari):
On Android (Chrome): tap the three-dot menu at the top right, tap Add to Home screen (some phones say Install app), then confirm. On Android either order works.
If you opened this link from inside Instagram, Facebook or Gmail, you are in that app’s built-in browser. It cannot add anything to your home screen, and a guide downloaded there is thrown away when the app closes. Open the link in Safari or Chrome first.
Two backstops. First, the map shows every site — just tap the marker for the place in front of you. Second, you can manually queue any narration even when GPS is off. The platform never assumes GPS works; it’s the convenience layer, not the gate.
The audio runs ~1–2 hours total, but you walk at your own pace. 14 narration points across the site. Most visitors take 2–4 hours; some spread it over multiple visits. Once you buy it, it’s yours — there’s no expiry and no subscription. Come back next year if you like; the link in your receipt always works.
One purchase covers one device session. Most couples share earbuds and use a single phone — the audio is paced for that. If you want everyone listening on their own device, each person needs their own purchase. We do not gate sharing aggressively; we trust visitors to do the right thing.
Full refund if you never trigger a single narration on-site. Partial refund based on how far you got. See the refund policy for specifics.