Take Me Down Ol' Tassie Way

Alright, first significant blog post. So Tasmania is pretty awesome, it's kind of how I imagine New Zealand to be like: very hilly, lots of sheep and not a whole lot of people. Also, it rains. A lot. As in 'every single day we were there it rained'. But I loved it anyway, I've never really been to a place like Tassie, it's so serene and slow-moving, definitely got that Island Culture thing going on. If you don't mind the rain, definitely worth the visit.

Some highlights: Wineglass Bay, possibly the most famous beach in all of Tasmania, it poured the entire time we were there and we got soaked to the bone hiking out to the bay and back, but it was all worth it for this shot:

You can kind of just make me out to the left of that wave that's bursting.

Port Arthur is your quintessential convict colony. Basically, these guys quarried, logged and built hundreds(!) of boats until England stopped shipping folks across the world as free labour. Not much left but ruins, still fun to explore.

Tesselated Pavement. Believe it or not, this stuff is all natural (or so we're told).

Cape Raoul was also ridiculously nice.

Oh, and check out my bush hat, pretty sleek, no?

Hobart is the capital of Tasmania and it's a really nice city, reminds me of a miniature Halifax. I took this picture from the top of Mt Wellington which overlooks the city. You can just make out the whisps of a rainbow above the city.



While in Hobart, Adam and I paid a much needed visit to the Cascades Brewery (good beer) and the Cadbury Chocolate Factory (sorry, no pics), where we loaded up on tons of "defective" chocolates on the cheap.

Spent a day sea-kayaking.

If you've never tried sea-kayaking, you really should, there's nothing quite like it. It's a lot more peaceful than river kayaking, but if you feel the need, you can always paddle out into some of the bigger swells (like we did) and just have a blast crashing through the waves. Also, sea-kayaks have rudders, so steering them is easy as pie.

We finished our Tasman Adventure by coming back up the West Coast and visiting such places as:
Russell Falls

Montezuma Falls, you can see Adam down there braving the wet.

The Cool Suspension Bridge you can cross to get a fantastic view of the falls.

Cradle Mountain, Tasmania's pride and joy. Apparently it snowed up here the day before we arrived.

The Nut

And then it was back on the ferry and farewell Tasmania.

Adam may never return (too wet) but I will. I could easily have spent a month down at the end of the world, but alas, we had to take the ferry back to the mainland before the prices jump up for summer (winter?) holidays.

Take care all, I should get some Melbourne stuff up soon.