 The Tasmanian Government resumed all of the island's freehold land and established the national park, proclaimed in 1972 and extended in 1991, to include part of the surrounding sea.Maria Island takes the form of a figure-eight, with the northern section of the island significantly larger than the southern.Both parts of the island have quite rugged relief and they are joined by a tombolo about long known as McRaes Isthmus.