Under Down Under Tour Day 2 (27th Nov)

Another early start for day 2 of our trip with our first stop being the small pictureque town of Ross.


Town plan of Ross - there was not enough time to walk all around it. Use your imagination!

I think that this town has some Scottish influence to it - waddayathink?



Centrepiece is this war memorial.



I didn't take many other pics as I was too busy getting some breakfast but I was drawn to this sign:



But as I have said - always look twice at any signs:



On the way to our next place we happened upon an Echidna so Ian turned the bus round and headed back to look at it. By the time we got there it had well and truely buried itself in the ground and was not for budging no matter what anyone did (short of taking a shoval to it) We did all get to feel its spikes though.



Once we left I looked back to see the wee turd getting up and walking away. I was sure it gave us the finger as well.

On to Freycinet National Park where the plan was to climb up a hill and get breath taking views of the famous curved sandy beach of wineglass bay. That was the plan but as usual the weather was against us with cloud mist and rain meaning that the hike to the top of the hill would be pointless.


Bloody mist!


DM is disheartened - don't jump DM!

This is what we COULD HAVE SEEN (taken off the internet)


If only!

We did manage to go down to some rocks and take pics of nice big waves:



We also got up close to some Bennetts wallabies in the parks car park:


Whos a wallaby?


Mother and joey


My new friend

Ian did have a contingency plan which involved firstly going to a blowhole in Bicheno (where we would be staying that night)


The gang at the blowhole

Unfortunately (theres a theme appearing here) the tide was not far enough in to produce a big spout - I still managed to get soaked though:


Bugger!

After the Blowhole it was on to Natureworld wildlife park which proved to be a great place. As well as the usual koalas, wombats, kangaroos, birds it also had large enclosures of snakes.


Its a koala train


Wombat


What a cute lil devil


Tiger Snake

I really liked this place as a wildlife sanctuary. Most of the enclosures looked to be big and well maintained (some of the bird ones where slightly small) Also most of their animals were abandoned or injured and were there because they could not be rehabilitated back into the wild. We arrived in time to see the keepers feed all the animals - including the devils (something which Ian had planned).


I had to buy one!

Devil Update:
This place was great for devils. They had several large enclosures an seem to be really well looked after. One of the keepers fed each of the sets of devils while explaing things about them. Some of them were like puppies - although we were still warned not to get too near them. THey also had a whole interpretation centre devoted to information on the devil and DFTD.





Some info on Devils from the parks centre.

Their top speed is about 13 kph - not very fast at all so they are mostly scavangers.

They can have up to 30 young each the size of a grain of rice which have to make their way to the pouch to find a nipple to suckle on. However they only have 4 nipples so only ever 4 of them will survive the initial birth - a harsh beginning in life.

They are very usful for getting rid of roadkill which, if left ontouched, would be used by flies to lay their eggs. THis results in less disease carrying flies.

One of the other major threats to wildlife on the island is foxes which so far are very scarse. This may be due to devils preying on fox young.

DFTD info
65% of Tasmania has been affected by the disease - mostly on the east side of cradle mountain.

The reduction of devils may result in an increase in foxes and feral cats which will be catestrophic to the rest of the islands fauna.


One final stop before heading to our hostel was to Diamond Island.


Diamond Island

One slight problem though. In order to get to the island you had to wade out to it over a sand bank!

Everyone rolled up their trouser legs (Its the first time on this trip that I was thankful for my zip off leggings) and over we went - Anthony leading the way.




Followed by us


And Anthony is over


Made it!


Even DM made it

Once we were over it was a very quick photo of the ones who had ventured over and then back as quick as possible before the tide came in!


Quick! - The ones that made it


And back we go!


Made it back. - Hurrah!

Another reason for getting back so quick was to get booked in to the hostel quickly so we could get to the local pub for HAPPY HOUR!

Pints and pots at half price for 1 hour. I did like any normal Irish person would and loaded up. They soon ran out of clean pint glasses and we had to use half pint (pots) instead.


Oh happy days, Happy hour


Hey thats my drink DM!

After some food we returned back to the hostel for an early night.

ANIMALS I HAVE SEEN:
Bennetts Wallaby (only new wild animal - I don't count wildlife parks)

THINGS I HAVE LEARNT:
Not a lot of people know that Errol Flynn was born in Tasmania. Even fewer people know that he lived in Belfast when his dad was a professor of zoology at Queens university.

Under Down Under Tour Day 1 (26th Nov).

After my non sleeping night in Hobart I was glad to be out of the backpackers and onto my tour around the East coast of the island.

The mini bus pulled up and a middle aged aussi jumped out and introduced himself as Ian. Already in the bus were 3 girls from California. Shayna, April and Noreen. At the same stop was Ben an English guy from Sussex. On we went around Hobart picking up the rest of the passengers. Annemiek from Holland, Anthony from Canada and Kari from Perth Australia. BTW Anthony did have the obligatory maple leaf on his backpack to tell the world that he is NOT American - although he did say it was actually his friend backpack.

Off we went to our first stop Port Arthur down the east tip of the island. On the way there Ian told us a bit about the trip and places. We also did photo stops at various places along the way:


Richmond Bridge - very old - for oz that is.


Tasman's Arch - not to be confused with the singer Tasmin Archer!

Port Arthur was a big penal colony for offenders who were too bad for even mainland Australia - a sort of Alcatraz. A lot of the place still stood and once we arrived we went on a guided tour. I use the word guided tentatively because it really consisted of a rotund woman pointing to various buildings from a grassy lawn and explaining quite fast what each of them were and what used to go on there. We did move at one point about 100 yards further on but I think this more due to trees obscuring buildings rather than any sort of touring. She then explained what the hidden buildings were before saying thank you and goodbye.


Main Penal Building - looking a bit rundown

After that we went back to the main visitor centre to look at some interesting stuff about the history of the place. As part of your entrance fee each person was given a playing card which corresponded to a convict on the island. Mine was the 7 hearts which corresponded to this:


I would get the lunatic!

We then had a cruise round the bay while getting more info from a speaker system on the boat.

For those who had paid extra there was the opportunity to be go ashore on Isle of the dead (i think that's the name) which is were they buried all the convicts who did not survive. The ones that got put off had to wait until the next cruise came around in about 1/2 hour. To be honest you could walk the island in 5 mins so I was glad I did not go.


Isle of the dead

After the cruise we still had nearly 2 hours to walk around by ourselves.

Unfortunately (or probably fortunately for you) after the boat cruise my camera batteries decided to give up the ghost and my spare batteries were back in the bus so I am going to rely on the others to send me some good photos.

After Port Arthur Ian made one more stop to the remarkable cave. It was so remarkable that it was closed and we couldn't get down to it!
There were some nice views though and while we were having tea and timtams Ian and Annemiek decided to climb down a pretty steep track to the shoreline. I decided that my tea would get cold and my timtam would melt. (I was chicken in other words)


Go down there - yeah right!

We headed back to Hobart. Kari was only with us for the day excursion so we said our goodbyes to her before heading to our YHA hostel. As Ian lives in Hobart he also said goodbye to us and would see us the next morning after he picked up another passenger.

After we settled in we all went for a walk into town for some food and ended up in an Indian restaurant having their Banquet menu. Its the sort of meal where you take servings from various unknown dishes and try to work out what it is that is burning the top of your gob off.

Once the meal was finished the girls headed back to the hostel and myself, Anthony and Ben went across the road to watch a band that seemed to be from prehistoric times.


Play those bongos granda!

THINGS I HAVE LEARNT:
No matter how much of a hurry you are in it pays to read what it says on food packaging:


Read the package carefully - Ah well they were like mini cadbury buttons.

There are no Koalas on Tasmania (too cold) but apparently the mainland population is rife with Chlamydia - the dirty beasts! I just wonder how they got infected in the first place?


GLOSSARY UPDATE:
T:
Timtams: Chocolate biscuits - basically Penguins biscuits from back home.

Hobart 25th Nov

I have learnt my lessons now when it comes to air travel:

1. Make sure you do not go out boozing the night before. Something I achieved, due mainly to the fact that all the pubs/bottleshops near the hostel are closed on Monday nights (weird but true)

2. Ensure your flight leaves as late as possible - 13:00 in this case.

So I had plenty of time to get ready, get to the airport and catch my flight. It all went perfectly.

Your waiting for the catch aren't you. Sorry there isn't one - the whole transport from beginning to end went without a hitch (I know I'm astounded too!)

I got the shuttlebus to my backpackers and booked in. Immediately I did not like the place - it was far too big. The Central City Backpackers was its name and it used to be a hotel and you could tell. It had 3 stories of room upon room. I was in a 6 bed dorm which was full up but luckily the vacant bed was a bottom bunk. I soon got my first shock of Tasmania when I tried to use the internet which was $5 for half an hour! Bloody hell that's the price of a stubby!

I had already decided that because I was going on a guided tour which started at 7.30am the next morning that I did not want to get to know anyone in the hostel (just in case I ended up boozing to all hours) Instead I did a mini tour of the town centre looking for a library which might have had free internet access. I found it but when I checked it out all the terminals were being used by kids! Once I gave up on that I decided to look for a cinema as I thought that the best and cheapest way to ensure I did not drink was to go to the flicks.

I did eventually find one and looked at the times. They had Quantum of Solace on which I wanted to see - but at 7pm - almost 2 hours later. I wondered what I could do until then. After several seconds of pondering I headed down to the Salamanca area at the waterfront and ended up doing minor pub crawl of some upmarket bars (including an irish one) supping very expensive pots (aussi for half pint glasses).

As I had not eaten since lunch I felt a bit tipsy as I made my way to the cinema - resolving to get some cheap grub on the way. This turned out to be an Indonesian that had a fine selection of gourmet meals on offer: Chicken Curry with Steamed rice or Beef Curry with Steamed rice. You could have gotten fried rice for an extra charge but they had run out. I got the chicken which was dished out together with the rice and curried veg onto the smallest plate I have ever seen. The portion was ok but it was piled so high on the tiny plate that any sudden movement caused half the rice to go on the table.

After eating half the curry I made my way to the cinema and relaxed to watch the film. My advice to anyone wanting to see this movie is don't! Perhaps I was still in a slight drunken haze but I thought it was shit. It was too fast paced and too hard to follow for my little sozzled brain. Rays-conservation-travels film review star rating: *

I give it one only because of the bond girl because I'd like to ... oh you know the rest!

It was still only 9pm when I got out of the cinema so I went back to the Salamanca area and had another couple of pots. I had the common sense to stop at that and was back in the hostel for 10:30 for a good nights sleep.

Did I get a good nights sleep. Did I arse. It just so happened that I had picked a room full of snorers. In fact these snorers even managed to do it in sync. It was almost symphonic with one starting where another one left off. There was even different pitches with a Bass, Tenor, Alto and one guy who managed to do a soprano squeak! I was glad to be up and out of there for 7am

BEERS I HAVE DRANK:
Boags Wizard Smith English Ale: Absolutely gorgeous and is now my preferred tipple although its quite dear.
Moo Brew pale ale: I never heard of this brewery before but again a really nice beer. Too expensive though
Boags St George (bottles) Had this in Melbourne - light fruity beer - a bit like a corona with a lime built in (only better)

PEOPLE I HAVE SEEN/MET:
On the way back to the pub I passed a park which had a group of teenagers in it. I thought that they must be doing the usual underage drinking lark but no they were juggling firesticks! That's Tassies for you!

THINGS I HAVE LEARNT:
When looking around a library for internet access it pays to look EVERYWHERE in the library. It is now the 6th Dec. I am back in Hobart and in the library on the second floor as opposed to the first floor where I looked last week. This floor is basically all computers (you idiot Raymond!)