"No matter where you go, there you are."

Tuesday 20^th March:

We spent a quiet morning around the van, drying the dive gear and giving the van a spring clean. At lunchtime we drove down the coast to Swansea to have a look at some the town’s galleries. We had some lunch overlooking Great Oyster Bay then headed back to Bicheno. We stopped at the Coombend Winery for a tasting on the way home.

Wednesday 21^st March:

Leaving Bicheno today and heading back to Hobart. The day was perfect for the run down along the coast road. We had spectacular views along the way and arrived at Bill and June’s place early afternoon. Once settled we drove in to Glenorchy Shopping Centre to stock up on groceries.

Thursday 22^nd March:

The Pajero went in for its 30,000km service this morning. We borrowed Bill’s car to drop it off and we also dropped off Twistie for a haircut. We had quiet day around the van then picked up the car and dog in the afternoon.

Friday 23^rd March:

We took a drive up the Derwent Valley this morning. The road meanders along the river and the scenery is very pretty. The trees are just starting to change into their autumn colours. We visited the famous Salmon Ponds and had a walk around their beautiful gardens. This place was set up in the late 1800’s for trout and salmon breeding. In the afternoon we went to the Sandy Bay Bowls Club for our last game of bowls in Tassie.

Saturday 24^th March:

It is very chilly this morning but the sun is shining. We had a lovely morning strolling around the Salamanca Markets. The atmosphere in the markets is great with all the buskers and colourful stalls. We played around on the net in the afternoon and booked a van park for the Easter period. We had to change our clocks back an hour this evening as daylight saving finishes.

Sunday 25^th March:

We took a drive out through Richmond to Sorrell to visit their Sunday market. It was quite big with lots of bargains. We spent a couple of hours fossicking at all the stalls but didn’t end up finding anything we needed. After we drove back in to Hobart and took a walk along the riverfront at Bellerive and got some photos of the city across the river. We spent the afternoon chatting with Bill and June as it is our last day here. We went to dinner at Monty and Debbie’s place and had an enjoyable evening.

Monday 26^th March:

We left Hobart for the last time this morning saying our farewells and thanks to Bill and June. We headed north up the through the Midlands to Gowrie Park. There is not much in Gowrie Park except the camping ground and a couple of houses. The town once housed up to 3000 people when the hydro dams were being built. It is quite eerie, there are lots of paved streets and street signs but all the houses have been removed and the bush is starting to grow over them. The camp ground is nestled beneath two large rocky mountains, Mt Roland and Mt Claude.

Tuesday 27^th March:

Wednesday 28^th March:

We had a lovely forest walk early this morning along O’Neill’s Creek. We have decided to move on to Deloraine for our last night in Tassie. We took the back roads through the mountains down to Mole Creek then on to Deloraine. The Apex Caravan Park is right on the Meander River that runs through the town. After setting up I walked up through town to check out the various galleries and shops. The museum housed the most exquisite silk embroidered panels depicting the history of the town. The ducks at the van park are very friendly and come right under the annexe looking for food.

Thursday 29^th March:

Our last day in Tassie, Sob! We took it slowly packing up and eventually left Deloraine at 10am. Our first stop was the Cheese Factory in Elizabeth Town. We filled our tummies with lots of cheese varieties and ended up buying a couple. The next stop was the Anvers Chocolate Factory. We ran amok in the tasting room trying dark chocolate, truffles and various fudges. We settled on a small pack of Choc Walnut Fudge. Yum! After dragging ourselves away from the chocolate we headed into Devonport to have a walk around the city centre. Unfortunately we couldn’t find parking with the van on so we drove out to the small town of Latrobe to spend the afternoon. Ferg took Twistie for a walk in the forest behind the town while I had a wander through the various antique and craft shops. We drove back to Devonport early evening and got to the “Spirit” in good time for loading. We didn’t have long to wait before were on board. Twistie stayed in the van for the crossing. We tucked up in our cabin early as it was going to be a rough crossing. We had a great two months in Tasmania and hope to return some day.

# posted by Ferg & Jude @ 12:04 PM

Saturday 10^th March:

It’s blackberry season in Tassie and they are everywhere! We went for a walk along the road and collected a couple of kilo’s of them. Our freezer is now full of washed and bagged berries, Yum! We played bowls again in Ulverstone in the afternoon.

Sunday 11^th March:

We visited the Penguin Markets this morning. They are held in the old Penguin school and there are over 200 stalls. Lots of yummy food to taste and crafts to look at. After a bit of grocery shopping in Burnie we spent a lazy afternoon around the van. We joined our neighbours for happy hour as the sun set.

Monday 12^th March:

We are moving on a short way up the coast to Wynyard this morning. The Beach Retreat Van Park is right on the beach at Wynyard and walking distance to town. We walked into town goes along the beach and river to visit the local info centre. We took a drive up to Table Cape to take in the stunning views of the coastline. We took a walk that wound around the cliff top to the lighthouse. It was a perfect day, not a cloud in the sky and the ocean was a stunning aqua colour.

Tuesday 13^th March:

Ferg went off for a long walk this morning and was away 2 hours. He got slightly lost and ended up walking a bit further than planned! Meanwhile I soaked up the sun and did a bit of embroidery. It really is a hard life (somewhere)! We drove to Fossil Bluff in the afternoon and did some rock hopping along the waters edge. The cliff face is covered in fossils encased in the sandstone.

Wednesday 14^th March:

It was another great day so we took a drive up to Stanley. The village of Stanley is nestled at the base of “The Nut”, which is a large volcanic plug that has been pushed up out of the ocean. The village is full of quaint old sandstone cottages and lots of cafes and galleries. We checked out a free camp spot at the wharf area. There were several vans parked there and we decided to move up there the next day. Back in Wynyard we played bowls at the local bowls club and Ferg won two frozen chooks. Our freezer is filling up with chooks, I’ll have to start cooking some of them!!

Thursday 15^th March:

We moved up to Stanley this morning, unfortunately all the other vans had moved on so we were on our lonesome. The van was dwarfed by the cliff face of the Nut. We left Twistie in the van and drove up to the chairlift that goes up to the top of the Nut. We took a one way ticket up and did a walk around the top to take in the views. The walk down was very steep and very hard on the knees. Ferg dropped me off in town to wander around the galleries and shops, then walk back to the van. Ferg and I spent the afternoon fishing off the wharf. The wind and rain set in early evening, bugger!

Friday 16^th March:

It rained all night and we awoke early at 5am. The van and car were surrounded by a large pool of water, we had parked in the only depression around, typical! We decided to leave the coast and head inland towards the Cradle Mountain National Park. We camped in the small town of Waratah, an old tin mining town. The council caravan park was very good. It provided good amenities and free washing machine and dryer. Unfortunately it rained all afternoon, we took a walk around town to look at the waterfall.

Saturday 17^th March:

It’s still miserable and no good for going to Cradle Mountain so we’re moving on. We drove south through Queenstown. The area around the town has been aggressively mined and it looks like a moonscape. We stopped for a cuppa at Nelson Falls in the Cradle Mountain National Park and took a short walk through the rainforest to see the falls. We then continued on winding up through the mountains and at one stage the temperature dropped to 6 degrees. We drove through the towns of Tarraleah and Wayatinah, both hydro electric towns. After 6 hours on the road we finally camped on the lake at the Wayatinah camp ground.

Sunday 18^th March:

At long last the front has passed over and the sun is shining. We are off to the east coast to get in a couple more dives. We drove across the midlands stopping at Oatlands for a morning cuppa. The township had many old sandstone buildings still lining the main street. On the road again the ocean was a welcome site as we came over the mountain range down to the east coast. We had spectacular views of the Freycinet Peninsula and Great Oyster Bay. We have camped again at the Bicheno East Tourist Park.

Monday 19^th March:

# posted by Ferg & Jude @ 4:35 PM

Tuesday 27^th February:

We had a slow start this morning as we were only moving a short way up the coast to St Helens. The town is a bit bigger than Bicheno and is known as the Game Fishing Capital of Tassie. We took a long walk around St Helens Point in the afternoon and got caught out in the rain ending up a bit bedraggled. The rain kept up all night so we stayed tucked up in the van.

Wednesday 28^th February:

It’s still raining this morning but it’s not going to stop us from sightseeing. We drove out to St Columba Falls which is in the mountains behind the small town of Pyengana. The walk down to the falls was through magnificent rainforest. The tree ferns flanked both sides of the path. The falls were running well with all the rain. On the way back through Pyengana we stopped at the local cheese factory for some tasting. In the afternoon we drove up to Binalong Bay and the Bay of Fires. We were checking out possible dive spots that the local dive shop had given us. There were some great free camp spots along the beaches at the Bay of Fires. There were quite a few caravans perched up on the sand dunes overlooking the ocean.

Thursday 1^st March:

It’s still overcast but we are going to dust of the fishing rods and try our luck out on the point. We fished for a couple of hours but I only got one bite which turned out to be a giant bullray and it broke my line. Later we took a drive south of St Helens up through St Mary’s Pass (built by the convicts) to the towns of St Mary’s and Fingal. Both towns had lots of old sandstone buildings from the convict days. We came down the mountain through Elephant Pass and stopped for some pancakes and coffee at the “Famous” Mt Elephant Pancake House. The sun was trying to break through as we drove back along the coast through Scamander.

Friday 2^nd March:

On the move again up through Weldborough, Scottsdale and on to Georgetown and Low Head. We stopped at the Weldborough Pass to take a walk through an ancient myrtle forest. Low Head is situated at the mouth of the Tamar River. We have a good spot in the van park overlooking the river. We had a drive around Georgetown and Low Head in the afternoon. The sunset over the river was spectacular.

Saturday 3^rd March:

We were off to discover some Tasmanian gold this morning. We had read about some old gold mines in the area around the town of Lefroy. We found the old mines in the state forest and spent a couple of hours detecting. Twistie found a big blue tongue lizard and I found a couple of bull ants (ouch!), but no gold was sighted. We tried our luck with fishing in the afternoon along the Tamar River in Georgetown. Ferg caught a small salmon on a lure but it jumped off on the rocks and escaped.

Sunday 4^th March:

We arranged to go diving in the Tamar River today. There is a spot around one of the channel beacons that is supposed to be pretty good. We had to dive on the top of the tide which today was at 12.30pm. The wind had picked up in the afternoon and the river swells were quite choppy. The local dive operator took us out along with one other fellow. The diving was great, a lot different from the coral reefs we know. We swam through our first kelp forest, what an experience! There were a lot of new fish varieties that we had never seen such as the boar fish. The water temp was a cool 22 degrees but we lasted for just under an hour. It was a bit tricky getting back into the boat with the big swells but the dive was well worth it.

Monday 5^th March:

We are off to do some sightseeing of the Tamar Valley district. We followed the east bank of the Tamar river heading south to the city of Launceston. We stopped at the small town of Windemere to admire a beautiful old church perched on the banks of the river. We stopped in Launceston at Cataract Gorge but we couldn’t take a walk into the reserve as we had Twistie with us and as usual “No Dogs Allowed”! Never mind we continued north along the west bank of the Tamar driving through some very pretty villages. We stopped at Beaconsfield to visit the gold mine museum. Eventually we came to the mouth of the river directly opposite to Low Head where we were camped. We took a short cut home via the Batman suspension bridge.

Tuesday 6^th March:

On the move again heading west today through Devonport to the small village of Penguin. We took the scenic route through Ulverstone and wound along the coastline road. We have an excellent site right on the water at the Penguin Caravan Park. We took a walk into town along the beach. Later we tried fishing, virtually from our doorstep, and we both caught a couple of fish. They were an unkown species so we gave them their freedom. We enjoyed a magnificent sunset overlooking the calm ocean and sipping on a glass of wine.

Wednesday 7^th March:

I tried out the local hairdresser today while Ferg played on the internet. In the afternoon we drove into Burnie for a game of bowls. We had a great time and the members of the South Burnie Bowls Club made us feel very welcome.

Thursday 8^th March:

The weather was perfect this morning so I dragged out my watercolours for the first time and painted a picture. The view was stunning sitting outside our van looking down the coastline. We did a spot of shopping in Burnie later in the morning and tried fishing again in the afternoon. It was just one of those perfect days to soak up the sunshine.

Friday 9^th March:

We took off early this morning into Burnie to have a walk around Fernglade Reserve. It’s lovely walking in the early morning before anyone else. We came across a small wallaby on the path. Afterwards we took the long way home via some spectacular farmland in the Leven Valley. We went bowling again in the afternoon, this time in Ulverstone. I played really well and actually won a frozen chook.

# posted by Ferg & Jude @ 4:14 PM