Tasmania's second city and Cataract Gorge's front door — where Launceston is Tasmania's oldest inland city (established 1806) and sits at the junction of the North Esk and South Esk rivers whose confluence at the Cataract Gorge (a 1-km-deep basalt gorge with a sheer 40-metre rock face that begins literally at the edge of the city's residential streets, 10 minutes' walk from the city centre) is the most dramatic urban natural feature in Australia, the Tamar Valley wine region (15 wineries within 30 km of the city centre, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from cool-climate Tasmanian hillside vineyards) begins directly outside the city boundaries, and Launceston has the most intact collection of Victorian and Edwardian commercial streetscape of any Australian city after Melbourne — all in a compact walkable grid 10 minutes from the gorge
Launceston (90,000 city; 120,000 greater area) is Tasmania's second-largest city at the junction of the North Esk and South Esk rivers, 60 km south of Bass Strait. Established in 1806 as a settlement serving the northern Tasmanian agricultural districts, it retains an extraordinarily complete Victorian commercial streetscape and is the northern gateway to the Tamar Valley wine region. MONA (Museum of Old and New Art), 2 hours south in Hobart, is accessible as a day trip.
The northern Tasmanian interior was the country of the Kanamaluka (North Midlands/Ben Lomond/Dorset) people of the Palawa nation before European settlement. Launceston was established in 1806 as the second settlement of the Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania) colony, primarily as a base to access the agricultural land of the Tamar Valley. The Black War (1820s–1830s) — the frontier conflict between the Van Diemen's Land colonial government and the Palawa people — was particularly intense in northern Tasmania; the Launceston Courier documented many of the atrocities committed by both sides, and the fi…