Brighton

Earmarked by Governor Lachlan Macquarie as the future capital of Tasmania, Brighton has never quite lived up to those vice-regal expectations, but the town 28km north of Hobart can boast long military links.

The first soldiers marched into Brighton on August 13, 1914 and a constant flow of troops spent the rest of World War I under canvas.

Since then, Brighton has been used as a training ground for successive generations of Australian soldiers and was also used as a haven for Kosovo refugees during the 1990s Balkan crisis.

Nearby Bonorong Park Wildlife Centre hosts such native animals as Tasmanian devils, kangaroos, wallabies, pademelons, emus, possums, koalas and wallabies.

The nearby village of Broadmarsh is well worth a visit if only to marvel at the Gothic revival style of architecture favoured by an early colonist, Dr John Rowe.

Rowe designed both the 1845, three-storey sandstone buildings still used as a post office and Stoneyhurst, an elegant Georgian home built in 1840 and which now houses a tearoom and craft shop.