Our Tassy Travels 2013

 

After catching up with family over Christmas & new year and getting a few more alterations completed on our van (new jacks and rear bumper bar with the help of my son) also some expensive maintenance on the car we went down to Ocean Grove for a few weeks house sitting but the owners had a change of plans and returned early so we had to make some new plans as well by heading back over to my sons place for a few days before leaving for Tasmania, we did enjoy our stay there though, I was able to do some running & a couple of bike rides , we did quite a lot of walking around the area also plus a swim.

We managed to get the van transferred to Vic. registration at great cost (we had to get the vin number stamped onto the frame at a cost of $50 for 5min work plus $45 booking fee on top of the registration & new no. Plate cost ???)  it is all good now though, and a good friend whom I worked with for many years has allowed us to store our van at his place although he did mention that he could make some money by letting it out. We left for Tas. On 25^th Feb which was a long day on the boat because it was running late, they were still unloading vehicles as others were being loaded, it was a perfect sailing though hardly a swell most of the time but of course when we arrived in Tassy it rained for a couple of days.

We have had a busy time doing our G/parent duties for a week and a half and fitting in some exercise when we can and now we are doing a bit of a tour around the state, at the moment we are in Hobart enjoying some beautiful weather which enabled us to drive up Mt Wellington for the great views, it is about 50yrs since I had been up the mountain and nothing has changed except for a couple of new buildings. Our next stop was the cadburys chocolate factory to get some bargains ???? they charge $7.50 to go in to watch a history video and enter their shop no tours now so we managed to get in for $7.50 for both of us which I still wasnt happy with and the chocolate was hardly any cheaper than retail but we did manage to get a easter bundle for reasonable price.

After the Cadburys dissapointment we headed off to lake Peddar stopping off at New Norfolk for a snack and visit the tourist info center, well I dont think the lady there gets many customers because we were still getting information as we were walking out the door after almost 30 min. we again headed towards lake Peddar and although it is a tedious journey  it is worth the round trip (160k) the scenery is beautiful, we stayed in the lodge at Strathgordon right on the lake, if not for the cost I could have stayed for a week (the lodge managers called there on their travels for a couple of days and have been there almost 3 yrs). I managed to get a jog in and we also were able to go for a swim in a 25m heated indoor pool  free to guests. We went down to the dam site which is simply amazing with the dam wall being 140m high, I was struggling with my vertigo but managed to get onto the wall down a series of steps a bit at a time. After reluctantly leaving there we made our way to Strahan, we stopped at Queenstown for lunch and while Marion was shopping I had a chat to a chap who came and asked me what we were up to, I asked him if he was a local and he replied "almost" I came here 63yrs ago to work and couldnt find my way out!!!!! after our pleasant chat we had lunch and proceeded on to Strahan arriving about 3.30pm then we had to find some accomodation and book our Gordon River cruise for the next day while dozens of other people were doing the same thing, while Marion was booking a park cabin some bikies were doing the same so the lady said that her husband rides a Harley and gave them a discount so Marion said she had one (matchbox) so she got a discount too, we then went to the cruise office and while booking we mentioned to the lady that we had left our camera battery chargers back in Vic. in our van so she said to meet her at her house after work and she might have one but to no avail(Tassy hospitality)

My new phone has come to the rescue though as it takes great photos, We departed on our cruise at 8.30am the next morning firstly making our way out through the entrance to the harbour then back into the harbour past the Salmon fish ponds and the convict island which we would visit later, then entering the Gordon River which brought back memories of when I worked here in 1965 ???, we proceeded up the river to a landing where we all embarked for a nature walk through the rain forest, all 150 of us and as we were filing past a slightly open section there was a snake on a log near the boardwalk which I was suspicious of so I waved my hand at it to see if it would move and another chap started berating me and giving me a lesson on nature, he was a greenie and for the rest of the trip he was telling people about it but no one was interested all they wanted was to get away from the snake in a hurry, the rest of the trip was great visiting the convict island and getting a guided tour from a local. After returning about 2pm we made our way up north and had to call into Zeehan for fuel, nothing was open but there was  serve yourself so I punched $50 into the machine but when I filled up it only gave me $48 and no one to complain to ,all was well though when I later checked my account, our next stop was Tullah where there is a lodge looking over another of Tassies great(hydro) lakes, this is where I did a triathlon (A few years ago) called the "Tullah Challenge"  so it was great to check it out again and I even went for a jog around part of the course, they still hold the race. Next day after a wonderful breakfast while sitting looking over the lake we proceeded back to our base at Marions daughter.

Finally got a link to some photos Click Here for a look