Tasmania

The next stage of my Australian adventure took me to Tasmania. I flew from Melbourne into Launceston, on the Northern part of the island. That was a fairly short flight across the Bass Strait. I had hired a car from the airport: a red Nissan Pulsar (which is the same as an Almera in SA!). My phone did good duty as a GPS, and navigated me to my AirBnB flat, which was very close to the town centre. I wandered into the centre, found the tourist info centre and some maps, etc. before exploring the town. Later in the afternoon, I met up with Debbie, and her two children for a river cruise that she had very kindly organised. That was great with excellent views of the town and the gorge of the South Esk river from the water. After the cruise we spent some time in the City Park, before meeting up with her husband Darryl and enjoying a very nice dinner together. I did some shopping at a supermarket near my flat on my back.

On the Thursday morning, I spent a bit of time exploring the town centre and doing some shopping, then took a walk along the North Esk River to the Queen Victoria Museum. That had some very interesting displays on the history of the island, and its various flora and fauna (including extinct Tasmanian tigers, which I had not heard about). There was also a very interesting (but cold!) area devoted to the railways of Tasmania, and a small section on space observation (with a planetarium). After some lunch at the flat, I drove up to the Cataract Gorge first basin site, which had a chair lift (which I didn't take!) and some excellent walks along the gorge. On returning to town, I tried to visit the National Automobile Museum of Tasmania, which was very close to my flat, but it was already closed, unfortunately.

The next day, Friday 2 June, I drove down to Hobart in the South of the island, taking a "scenic route" along the Eastern coastline. I stopped for a walk along the coast and a coffee in Swansea, and later for lunch on a beach in Orford. The drive was beautiful, with sea views and forests and hills along the route. I reached Hobart fairly early in the afternoon, and stopped in the centre of town to visit the tourist info centre and pick up some maps, etc. before finding my AirBnB. That was on one of the main roads through Hobart, a good walk from the centre, but with no real need to use the car. The AirBnB was a self-contained flat again, and this one was palatial! It had a lounge, kitchen and en-suite bedroom, with top quality new appliances, fittings, etc., including a Nespresso coffee machine! After settling in there, I walked down into town and had a stroll around the harbour area, before treating myself to a delicious dinner of Tasmanian salmon in a very nice restaurant in the harbour.

On Saturday morning I got going fairly early, as I wanted to visit the famous Salamanca market. That was amazing, with a huge range of arts and crafts and food (a little reminiscent of the Village Green at the Festival in Grahamstown). After that I met up with an old University friend David, and his wife, Nicole and their children. We drove up Mt Wellington, which has incredible 360-degree views over Hobart and the neighbouring countryside. After that we had lunch at a lovely little inn on the road up to the viewpoint, and then went down to Battery Point, near the harbour where we strolled around and had some coffee, before wandering back down to the harbour area, taking in some of the art galleries along the way (including a fascinating "art from trash" display). After an early dinner of calamari, David and family dropped me off at my palace.

I woke up fairly early on Sunday and went to church at Hillsong Hobart, which was very close to where I was staying. That was interesting, being a video-linked service from the main Hillsong church in Sydney, who had an American guest speaker. After church I packed up and headed to the airport where I dropped off the hire car, and caught my flight to Sydney. I took the train out to the Northern suburbs and Patrick very kindly picked me up from the station.

The Monday was spent catching up with laundry and doing some blogging, answering emails, etc., etc. In the late afternoon Pam was taking Max to the sports centre, so Tom, Khia and I went along for a walk in the park area around the centre!

On Tuesday morning, Patrick and I were up rather early, as he had offered to give me a lift to the airport for my flight on to New Zealand - the next big step of the adventure!