Tasman Island Cruise or Bruny Island Cruise?

The Tasman Island cruise and the Bruny Island cruise are the same kind of trip on two different coasts: both are Pennicott Wilderness Journeys’ 3-hour wilderness cruises in the same 43-seat boats, at the same A$190 adult price (November 2026). The Tasman Island cruise leaves Port Arthur and goes under Cape Pillar and out to Tasman Island; the Bruny Island cruise leaves Adventure Bay on Bruny Island and goes along South Bruny to the seals at the Friars. The Tasman Island cruise is From Port Arthur: Tasman Island Wilderness Cruise, from US$134 a person (checked November 2026).

The calendar above is the Tasman Island cruise from Port Arthur, with 792 reviews (checked November 2026).

The short answer

Choose by where you will be, not by which is better. Both are 3 hours on open boats below sea cliffs, with seals and seabirds and the same jackets and ginger tablets. If you are going to Port Arthur, or want the tallest cliffs and a lighthouse on a sea-girt island, take the Tasman Island cruise. If you are spending a day or a night on Bruny Island, take the Bruny Island cruise from Adventure Bay. If three hours at sea is more than you want, Pennicott’s 90-minute Cape Raoul cruise from the Port Arthur Historic Site is the short version.

The three cruises, side by side

Operator prices from Pennicott’s own sites, November 2026; listing prices per person from GetYourGuide (checked November 2026). The Cape Raoul prices are stated as valid until 31 March 2027.

Where they differ

The cliffs. The Parks and Wildlife Service calls the Tasman National Park’s sea cliffs Australia’s highest, and the Tasman Island cruise spends its time below Cape Pillar and around Tasman Island, a 280 m plateau with a lighthouse on top. Pennicott describes the Bruny Island cruise as passing some of Australia’s highest sea cliffs too, with the gap between the coast and the Monument, Breathing Rock and the seal colony at the Friars as its set pieces.

Getting there. Port Arthur is a 90-minute drive on sealed roads. Adventure Bay is about 1 hour 45 minutes from Hobart including the car ferry from Kettering (45 minutes to Kettering, a 15 to 20 minute crossing and 40 minutes to Adventure Bay), plus the ferry queue on busy days. Without a car, Pennicott runs a full day from Hobart to each, both at A$290 an adult.

Times. The Tasman Island cruise checks in by 9:15 am all year, with an afternoon cruise from 1 December to 28 April. The Bruny Island cruise sails at 11 am all year, and at 10 am and 1:30 pm as well from 1 December to 28 April. Both run daily except Christmas Day.

What else is there. Next to the Tasman Island cruise is the Port Arthur Historic Site, about 800 m on foot from the booking centre. Next to the Bruny Island cruise are Bruny’s beaches, The Neck, Cape Bruny Lighthouse and the island’s oyster and cheese producers; bruny-island-tour.com covers that cruise, the ferry and a day on the island in depth.

Check dates for the Tasman Island cruise

The Cape Raoul cruise, the short one

Pennicott’s Cape Raoul cruise is 90 minutes from the jetty inside the Port Arthur Historic Site, south-west past Point Puer, the Isle of the Dead, Safety Cove and the dunes of Crescent Bay to Cape Raoul, where Australian fur seals rest at the foot of dolerite columns over 250 m high, with views across to Cape Pillar and Tasman Island. It sails at 10:45 am and 1:15 pm, the boat is enclosed and wheelchair accessible, and Pennicott gives a full refund if it cancels for weather. Every passenger needs a Historic Site entry ticket, so the cruise-only fare of A$140 suits visitors who already hold one; with entry it is A$190 for an adult. It won Tasmania’s best new tourism product at the Tasmanian Tourism Awards 2025.

The Cape Raoul cruise carded below on GetYourGuide is the cruise without site entry, so add a Historic Site ticket to it; the version with entry included is the Cape Raoul cruise and site entry on Viator, from US$136 (checked November 2026).

Prices, ratings and review counts from the listings (GetYourGuide checked November 2026; Viator checked November 2026). Operators price by date and season, so treat the figures as the shape of the market, not a quote.