From the east to the west...

So much has happened since my last update that I don't know where to begin. I guess I've got to get better at doing these entries a bit more regularly!

Because I enjoyed the 2 day east coast trip so much, I decided to sign up for the 3 day west coast trip! You can also do a 5-day lap of Tassie, which is ultimately what I did, but I just had a 2 day break in between! The west coast trip was equally as beautiful and as fun as the east coast. Nothing captured my heart quite like Wineglass Bay did, but it was still fantastic. This time in the group, we had 2 German girls, a Canadian guy, 3 French people, an Irish girl, a Dutch woman, and three Brazilians. They were all a blast. In fact, the girlfriend of the tour guide said that she had never seen a group bond so quickly!

We started off by walking through the rainforest in Mt. Field National Park. It was beautiful! Many of the plants in the Tasmanian rainforests are ONLY found in Tassie...not anywhere else in the world! I think that is pretty cool.

 I am standing in the middle of the tree trunk...look how huge it is!

Russell Falls

This photo was taken out the van window as we were driving along. Tassie is so picturesque!!

Later in the day, we hiked to the top of Donaghy's hill to see the spectacular views of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage area.

For our accommodation for both nights, we stayed in a tiny town called Tullah and our hostel was right on the lake. Here is our view!

The next day, we started out with a 1.5 hour hike up to Montezuma Falls, Tassie's highest waterfall! The hike was really nice because it was through rainforest all the way.

Here I am in front of Montezuma Falls! It is 341 feet tall!

It was so tall that I couldn't get it all to fit into one photo, so there is the top...or the mouth of the waterfall...whatever the proper term is!

From the falls, we headed to the Henty sand dunes! They were AWESOME!! I think these dunes were probably one of the biggest highlights on this trip for me!

How pretty is this?!  White meets blue.

And of course, what do you do on sand dunes? JUMP!

Haha, jumping pictures are hilarious! Looks like I hadn't quite made it off the ground yet! (I'm on the end). 

Is anyone going to jump with me? I'm not done yet! I could've done this for hours!

Look, we even found some wallaby pawprints in the sand!

In the evening, a group of us sat by the lake and watched the sunset.

Seriously such a fun group of international people! The Brazilians stick out in my mind because they were just so enthusiastic about everything. "Beautiful" was their word, whether describing the taste of the chicken they had for dinner or the magnificent scenery...I loved them! I hope to visit them in Sydney when I go there. They are currently living there.

On the 3rd day of the trip, we headed to Cradle Mountain! The last time I was here was in the middle of winter and it was SOOO cold. We walked around Dove lake then, which lies at the bottom of the mountain. This time, we hiked up to Marion's lookout for a spectacular view. Whether summer or winter, Cradle Mountain is just breathtaking!

Winter: Cradle Mountain is behind me.

Another winter photo.

And here it is in summer! So pretty!

It was a difficult hike up to the lookout! Very steep! I am young and pretty in shape, but it was still tough. We were so happy when we made it to the top!

Some of the group...tired from hiking but pressing onward!

A group of us resting at the top of the lookout! We made it!

Wahooo! Jump right in the cradle! :)

View from the top....beautiful! I think Cradle Mountain was the other highlight of the trip for me!

From there, we headed to a honey farm where they had 50 different flavors of honey to taste. So yummy! We also had honey ice-cream!

We also passed through a little town called Sheffield, town of murals. There are murals painted everywhere; on the sides and backs of buildings, etc. Below is one I liked....and it's got Tassie devils.

And here is a sign that was on the bathroom door of this salmon farm that we stopped at. If you look closely, you will see that Australians do not discriminate. ;)

Well that's about it for my trip to the west coast. It was tons of fun and a really great group of people to travel with. Thanks to facebook, I can now stay in contact with most of them, which is really cool. 

Just a quick update about where I am now. I am no longer in Tassie...I am now in Canberra, the capital of Australia and the place of my birth! I still have a few more fun things from Tassie to blog about and then I can post about Canberra, so.....stay tuned! I'll try and blog a bit more frequently to get caught up (key word...try). Until then, here's the....

Aussie Fact of the day: Some people are now calling themselves Kangatarians, people who don't eat any meat except for kangaroo. They say that it is eco-friendly. I don't like it.
For more info, go to http://schott.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/23/kangatarians-vegeroos-cameltarians/

Pigs, Penguins, and Pet Rats

Hello again! Sorry it's been so long since my last post. I've been pretty busy traveling around Tassie, so I just haven't been able to blog. Let's see...where to begin? There's so much to report!


Since my last post, I have spent a total of 3 luxurious, sunny days on the beach! The beach I've been going to is called Seven Mile Beach...yep, it goes for 7 miles...and no, I have not walked along the whole beach! So many people walk their dogs there and it's so fun to see the dogs swimming in the water. I just recently learned that Golden Retrievers are the most common dog in Tassie...yeah Goldens! (I have one at home for those of you who don't know and I miss him dearly!) I've seen people brave the water and go swimming, wind surfing, regular surfing, etc. I just love the beach. I feel so serene on the beach...probably more so than any other place. Who needs an Ipod when you have the roaring waves to listen to?! I think I could easily become a beach bum!

Crazy hair!

Quick story: On the bus today going to the beach, I ran into this couple who I had been on the bus with before, also when I was headed to the beach. They are really nice. But today, when they sat down in the seats in front of me, out of a bag, they pulled out their pet rat!!! His name is Gordon and they take him everywhere because he doesn't like to be left alone! Haha! He just sat on the lady's shoulder...crazy! I'm not a huge fan of rats, but he was pretty cute. You just never know what you are going to run into in Tasmania!

As promised, I went back to the market at Salamanca. It was wonderful! Let's see, I started out by eating a fresh fruit cup of raspberries, strawberries, and blackberries with real whipped cream. Yum! Then for lunch, I had tempura mushrooms and then for an afternoon snack, I had a home-made yogurt with fresh raspberries. So delicious! You can pretty much just eat your way down the aisles of the market. However, eating is not all I did. Remember how I said I was going to buy a lot....well I was right! I bought 2 silk dresses, a purse, 3 necklaces and 3 pairs of earrings, and a few other small things. I love that market...it is just so fun wandering up and down and checking out all of the different items.

Later that evening, we went out for Mexican. Stacy's sister Amanda and her friend Anita were in town. Here's a pic of the girls....James was the photographer. Oh and check out my new silk dress!

James, Stacy and I also went to the Taste of the Huon, basically a festival in the Huon Valley. It was awesome...so many different foods there! I had salmon for lunch and then raspberry ice cream for dessert. Very tasty!

I also went on a 2 day tour of the east coast of Tassie and it was amazing! The company I went with is called Jump Tours and it is geared toward younger, active travelers (not just sitting on a bus) and it is definitely the best tour deal that I have found. We had a vanful of different ethnicities: 3 Japanese girls (I cannot remember their names, but they all start with M..they were so much fun!), Vincent from Holland, Johannes from Germany (he told me to call him Yo), an Italian couple, and a French couple. I really enjoyed everyone....except for the French man. He got on everyone's nerves....he was a bit much and he talked all the time, and he never was on time so he made us late for things. Besides that, it was a really awesome group to travel with. I hung out mostly with Vincent and Yo since the 3 of us were traveling alone. They were tons of fun and there were definitely some funny moments with Yo as things got lost in translation when communicating with each other. We had a lot of good laughs! His English really is quite good.


So the first stop on our trip was Launceston, called the "Garden City" because of all the gardens and parks.  We went to the Cataract Gorge which runs through the middle of the city. Unfortunately it was raining then, but you can still see how pretty it is.

In Launceston, we also saw some Japanese monkeys in a park. The story is that Japan traded some monkeys with Australia for some wallabies (type of kangarroo)! Ha!


After Launceston, we saw the unique chainsaw tree carvings in Legerwood. It's pretty amazing that someone did this with a chainsaw!

Still rainy!

From there, we tasted cheese at the Pyengana Dairy and then visited Priscilla, the famous beer drinking pig! She really drinks beer....they call it the Pub in the Paddock. They of course dilute the beer with water or else she would be drunk all the time. She drinks a bottle in about 3 seconds!

There she is...looking thirsty!

Haha, I just had to have my picture by Priscilla's sign!

After that, the day finally cleared up and we headed to the beautiful Bay of Fires, rated by the Lonely Planet as the world's number 1 destination for 2009. It was magnificent....pure white sand and crystal clear water!

You'll see a lot of jumping pics since the name of the group is JUMP Tours.

Finally blue sky!

 So BEAUTIFUL! I had a hard time choosing which pictures to post, so you'll have to click on the link at the bottom to see more!

We stayed the night in a little town called Bicheno. In the evening, there's fairy penguins that cross from an island to the shore in Bicheno for protection. After dinner, Vincent, Yo, and I headed out to try to see a penguin and......we saw 2! They were really little ones. I don't have any photos because the flash hurts their eyes, so unless you have some kind of red lighting to put over the flash, you can't take pictures. We walked a long ways to see those penguins so it was pretty exciting! Then we enjoyed the nice night on the beach with some wine and gazing at the stars.

The next morning, we went to a wildlife park and saw all of the unique Australian animals, including Tasmanian Devils, kangaroos, koalas, wombats, etc.

My new friend!

Tasmanian Devil!

Koala!

Wombat!

I LOVED this little goat! I want to keep him!

From there, we headed to the Freycinet Peninsula and hiked the treck to Wineglass Bay lookout. The views were just incredible!

 Finally made it to the lookout...it was quite a hike!

There it is...magnificent Wineglass Bay!

JUMP! After hiking to the lookout, we took the long trek down the beach and ran into the water baywatch style. It was seriously the best swim of my life! SO refreshing after all that hiking.

I love Wineglass Bay! It was the highlight of the trip for me!

Finally, our last stop of the trip was the historic town of Ross which has the 2nd oldest bridge in Tasmania.

So that concludes my 2 day trip of the east coast. I had a wonderful time! Everything was so beautiful and I had a blast with the group. Tasmania really is beautiful everywhere you go.

I still have much more to post because since this trip, I have also done a 3 day tour of the west coast. I'm all blogged out now, so that'll just have to wait a bit longer. Until next time, here's the...

Aussie Fact of the Day: Many Tasmanian Devils are being killed by the Devil Facial Tumour Disease. It is a rare cancer that can be spread like a contagious disease. Unfortunately, the devil population is really being wiped out by this fatal disease. There is a lot of research underway to figure out where it came from and how the devil population can be saved. 

For more pictures, go to http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2033882&id=177500204&l=be9b0e84d3