Tasting the Temptations of Tasmania!

Many times Anja has remarked to me how big my homeland is! Recently she was asked so 'if you now live in Australia you don't need to take holidays'? Well for these two hardened travellers an adventure is always on our minds so that was what exactly we wanted to do by visiting the most southern part of this vast continent Australia. The Australia Day long weekend at the end of January was when we decided to fly to Hobart the capital of the Apple Isle and the last remaining capital city I had never visited. We took an extra day and flew late on Friday night and treated ourselves to a taxi from the airport to our motel (yes not hostel!). This was our first "Tassie" moment as the taxi driver was short on conversation apart from "how was the flight" "is this your first time here" and then as we crossed Tasman Bridge the only tourist attraction pointed out to us was the "large white building to the left is the casino" which we strained to realise was the six storey building in the distance. We also were quite taken aback to see how dry it was but this was also revealed in our research that Hobart is the second driest capital city in Australia behind Adelaide. Our first night we discover a bar called "Das Zimmer" which is German for "The Room" so we sat back and enjoyed a Becks whilst checking out the locals. A late night visit to the 24 hour bakery and we headed back to the luxury of our own hotel room.

Salamanca Markets

Saturday and there is only one thing to do in town and that's the famous Salamanca Markets which has an enormous amount of stalls and we discovered also the allure of Bratwurst of many varieties in rolls. There was perhaps too many people for myself but the custard filled donut seemed to be a way to placate myself long enough for Anja to go through the multitude of offerings. Nearby was the beautiful village of Battery Point which took us back in time and was very pretty. A mate from Brisbane had sold us on the virtues of the Cascade Hotel and the delicious schnitzels they cooked. So as we left our hotel that evening we enquired at reception to get another sample of Tassie humour " It's about nine dollars by taxi there and nine dollars back" .On further probing we discovered it was on a main street so being the walkers we are we instead walked this short distance and actually arrived after about twenty minutes walk to this small pub at 5.30pm. Well we both had worked up an appetite so we headed in to see it was pretty quiet but nearly all tables appeared reserved! So we sheepishly asked for a table for two and got one luckily, well I couldn't resist asking for the Super Schnitzel so it was pretty overwhelming when out came a large plate with a schnitzel covering it all! Thus the nine dollar taxi ride walk back into Hobart was very necessary as we found a nice spot by the water to enjoy this sleepy but enjoyable city.

Stunning Scenery

Sunday morning and we were up early to get to the car hire place to pick up the larger than expected Ford Mondeo to take a drive to Port Arthur a historic convict site just under two hours away. After leaving the outskirts we discovered our first Tassie Devil sign so we couldn't resist getting out of the car for some photos.

Jason and the "Devil"

Having a car gave us the chance to jump out wherever we wanted as we took this scenic ride but it wasn't too late before we arrived at Port Arthur.This lead to another classic piece of Hobartness when I used the Eftpos to pay admission the attendant asked " Can I ask a personal question" , which we thought would be a postcode question but it was " Do you have a chequebook" so after leaving there we headed to our boat tour. Port Arthur was a place of stark contrasts, it was such a pretty beautiful scenic area so to hear all the tales of this being a a place for convicts in the 1800's was hard to fathom. We searched through this vast site after an informative tour before we made the drive back along some very stunning roads.

Anja in the Habour of Port Arthur

Jason in Port Arthur

Another tip was to visit a local Fish restaurant called Mures so Anja could sample the famous fresh Tassie fish while I was content to eat chips and very large potato scallops (they call them potato cakes down that way). Again a walk along the waterfront was needed before we went to the Customs Hotel to have a Cascade beer (another recommendation from my mate in Brissie) so that Anja and I could watch some indeed interesting locals! Australia Day arrived and we were again up early bypassing overindulging in the full buffet breakfast as we were going on a boat cruise to Bruny Island. Upon checking in we of course had to sign the disclosure in regards to safety (who reads those things?) and given our very large jackets for the jet boat ride later. The forty five minute cruise to Bruny Island gave us a chance to see how spread out Hobart was and see some of the coastline.








Stunning Coast Line on the bottom end of Bruny Island


We also saw where our Aussie Princess Mary from Denmark went to high school :). This was also a nice moment for Anja as someone asked where we were from and she replied "Sydney" well it is true now. Our destination Bruny Island came upon us and two mini buses met us and we chose the one that was to be driven by a fourth generation Bruny Island resident, sadly no commentary but nonetheless we enjoyed the sights. Now was the time we were to suit up as our jet boat arrived and a tactical decision was made to sit in the middle just in front of the driver. Leaving the bay we did the obligatory 360 degrees turns and rounded out into the open sea to come amazingly up close and personal to a pod of frolicking dolphins. We didn't even have time to get the cameras out as our guide explained they must be off to eat as no time to play. It was about now I discovered that my land legs weren't enjoying this as much as I would of liked but I put on a brave face for Anja. Still though as we hugged the coast the rock formations were spectacular and we moved from the Tasman sea to the Great Southern Ocean and the most southernly point of the large continent being my homeland. Just as I thought I could take no more we came to the resting place of a multitude of seals and immediately my spirits were lifted.








Australian Seals


They seemed so comfortable with our presence and continued to bask in the sun and play in the ocean whilst we watched in astonishment. After some time we headed back and to make it quicker we headed to more open ocean to my dismay as we picked up speed.








Just before taking up some speed again...


Even though we came across things such as an Albatross I was more than relieved to be back on land at the end but it had been a great ride. The bus we chose on the way back had the guide so we heard a little bit more about the settlement of this very southern outpost. Our boat arrived with other passengers along for a cruise and it was lunchtime where we had a delicious platter of local produce and I watched Anja overcome with joy from the tasty bread. After a short stop at a resort we cruised back to Hobart and we enjoyed pizza for our evening meal followed by a walk around Hobart for our final evening in this quiet city. Also we gathered some intelligence regarding the Cadbury factory and discovered that it wasn't offering full tours so we made a decision to visit Richmond an historic village a little out of Hobart on our final day. Avoiding a tour after indulging one more time at the buffet breakfast we checked out and made our way to the bus stop. The bus we took was a normal service full of business people so after they all got out at the Hydro Plant we continued another 14km to Richmond. This quaint village is home to Australia's oldest bridge built in the 1830's and also the oldest Catholic Church which had been visited by Pope John Paul in the 80's. It was a role reversal to be able to take Anja somewhere where there was some history and we truly enjoyed wandering the streets of Richmond and time flew before we had to catch the only bus back to make it back to Hobart to catch our flight back to Sydney. Hobart was really a place we found to be very interesting but also very different to how we thought it may be. The landscape was so dry and a contrast to when I had only thought of it being a lush green land so that was eye-opening indeed. We both found the people so welcoming and loved being able to walk the streets especially in Salamanca as the history has been embraced there and kept for the future. Also these two keen travellers know we will want to visit the Apple Isle again to explore it more as we are sure we have only had a brief taste and want more!

For more photos click here: http://www.flickr.com/gp/80037206@N00/z9CtTy


Jason