Heather Ewart heads to the 'Back Roads' of Evandale

That tourist was Heather Ewart.

The much-loved, award-winning journalist has spent four days in the village south of Launceston filming an episode for next season's Back Roads - Ewart's popular ABC program that looks at Australia's regional towns.

"I do really enjoy that people feel they can approach us, because that's the idea; we're shining a light on ordinary Australians as ordinary Australians," Ewart said.

Back Roads has been an enormous success for the broadcasting company, and for Ewart, who first delved into the country towns of Australia in 2015 with places like Ceduna and Winton - usually touching on one town from each state.

In the past, the show has filmed episodes in other Tasmanian towns like Scottsdale, Penguin and Longford, always with an ethos of "finding something different or charactered".

Back Roads - which is now closing in on a decade of production - has arrived in Evandale to cover some of its quirkier residents and events, like the markets, Glover Prize, Verandah Music Festival and National Penny Farthing Championships.

"I've been hooning around on a three-wheeler in some of the segments for the show so far, but I have a sinking feeling that they're going to try and get me onto a penny farthing," Ewart said.

"I haven't agreed to that just yet."

Ewart is always on the lookout for the characters of country Australia who make up the idiosyncrasies of small towns, and met plenty of them in Evandale.

Meetings with local artists and farthing enthusiasts were picks of the bunch, while chats with Evandale Market's founders provided an insight into the heart of the South Esk River community.

And those unique characters - which often make up the vigour of the program - were interspersed with discussions of Evandale's convict history and the upkeep of its buildings - an operation that has kept the town's character intact.

Because for Ewart, the pull of Evandale is not just its events, it's its past - the Colonial Georgian homes of its streets are only snippets of the town's standing monuments to history - and how its preservation is really "preserving its future, too".

"You're always going to have crowds wanting to look at something preserved, then, once they're in, you have the events," she said.

"But so many old buildings in Australia were bowled over in that dreadful '70s era of 'smartening up' things, so to speak. That modernisation changed things but here it's been preserved and that's to its benefit.

"There are so many reasons for people to come here, and that's part of the uniqueness."

And, alongside the excitement just the film crew brings to a town itself, Back Roads may well have an influence well past the time Ewart heads back home.

The show has had a documented positive impact well after it leaves locations, usually inspiring travellers to take to the road and dip their toes into off-the-beaten-track locales.

One of its first episodes - filmed in the small Victorian town of Yackandandah - increased the towns visitation numbers by 30 per cent after it aired.

"It's always been really great for out of the way places," Ewart said.

"I remember a small town near Lightning Ridge where we stayed in the only pub in town - one a local farmer had saved - and after we left he called me to say they've had visitors nonstop.

"He's adding new cabins and a new caravan park because of that success and I love hearing that.

"I know Evandale is very much on the tourist map, but I'm hoping people visiting Tasmania will head here because it deserves that reputation."

And for Ewart, the show and a town like Evandale are close to her heart, having grown up in country Victoria herself in places where it was almost a wild west.

While Evandale may be far from wild, it is a place where people are "doing interesting things outside of the big cities" - and putting that in the spotlight has proven extremely popular with all of Australia, likely for the sense of cultural identity it emits.

"Living in a town like this, an even smaller one, is how I grew up," Ewart said.

"I know what kinds of good people are out here and it's been great for me to be able to be a voice for them and for them to speak back."