March 1st -- Day 7

Well after a week in Tasmania we have seen a ton and I can barely remember what happened each day without reading back through my blog posts. Every night is in a different place and it is extremely nice to see a good portion of the state but some consistency is nice. I guess we will get some much needed down time when we settle into home stays on the 6th in Lismore. Today we took the Lady Jane Franklin II up the Gordon River for a morning boat cruise. It was a great change from driving around in the bus and tromping through the woods.


We got the chance to hear a lot about the local history of Strahan and the surround areas. She cruised at about 27 knots and is a very slick looking catamaran. We spent about 6 hours on the tour which involved a stop over on Sarah Island aka "Hell on Earth" this place was one of the convict colonies that was established as an Auschwitz-like work camp that was there for the harvesting of the local Huon Pine trees. In their infinite wisdom, the English decided to clear cut the island. Brief Meteorology/Climate spiel, Tasmania sits in the midst of the "roaring 40s" which is the band of southern latitude where winds hurtle across the globe unabated by land masses. This is/was great for shipping because they could essentially ride the conveyor belt but trees form great wind breaks. Tasmania also sits at a similar location to New York in the states, minus the large land mass to regulate inland temperature. To recap, the English clear cut an island south of 40 degrees longitude that is completely exposed to one of the harshest climates in the world and they didn't have central air, just a few wood stoves.

Needless to say, they quickly realized their boo-boo (first winter) and constructed giant walls around the island to act as wind breaks until the trees grew back. After this they began handing out lashings to all of the prisoners and they kept record of this. 200 convicts received 3500 lashings in just under 11 years and there were over 120 escape attempts.

Listening to: Sergei Saratovsky - Chopin, Nocturne in B major, Op. 9 No. 3 (thanks Marin)

After our cruise down the Gordon River we headed for Cradle Mountain National Park, I was very excited about this. Any time we get away from all forms of civilization the hair on the back of my neck stands up in anticipation. Cradle Mountain is part of the World Heritage Area that also encompasses Lake St. Clair in central Tasmania. The mountain itself rises to 1545m (5069 ft) and usually has snow on it for most of year apart from summer. We have been blessed with great weather in Tasmania so far and today was no exception. We got into our bunk house at about 5pm and had a few hours of daylight to blow before we spun up dinner, so Gus and I headed out on a little day hike.

No more than 30 meters down the path we stumbled upon a mom and baby Wombat (now seen every animal I want to see down here minus Tasmanian Devil) who were taking a break at a little pond to get a drink.
Wombats might be the dorkiest/moronic animals on the face of the planet. It is blatantly obvious they have no natural predators because their reaction time and decision making rivals that of a squirrel who has been rendered deaf and blind. When people speak of hunting Wombats they mean, "I walked over, picked up the Wombat, and took it home with me". Don't get me wrong, they are adorable and I'm sure serve some deeper purpose in the web of life but it is lost on me. As Gus and I headed up towards Crater Lake we saw a few more Wombats but none as close as these. It was a really good hike and we passed a really nice waterfall before reaching the lake.

Pretty pleased with myself over this shot.

After we reached this point is was a short climb up to the lake to check out a nice mountain lake that was a serene place to just relax and unwind.
At this point I decided to take my watch out to see how much time had passed by and Gus and I realized we had 15 minutes before we were supposed to be cooking dinner at the bottom of the hill. Needless to say, we began running down the hill and made it down in 12 minutes (we hiked this same pathway later with the group and it took 26 minutes to descend...) and made it back in time to get dinner cooked and ready. Our behavior definitely falls under the "no-list". A peaceful, restful night filled with fireside guitar playing followed after the minor drama that unfolded earlier.

Listening to: Cure for the Itch - Linkin Park (don't judge, my iTunes is on shuffle)

March 2nd -- Day 8

We split into two groups today and did two different hikes. One went around one of the lakes and the other took the trail that Gus and I did, but went to the peaks you see in the background of the last picture. Decided I would like to see it from up there so I took the latter option. We started out pretty early on in the day (would have loved to wake up really early and summit Cradle Mt. but no such luck) and hit this part once we got to the mountain.
Just a set of ledges that some poor trail crew got to anchor a chain rail to at some point that shoots straight up the face of the mountain. Australians choose steps over switchbacks. Once we hit the outlook point we had a great 360 view of the park and Cradle Mountain.

Hung out at the outlook for about 30 minutes and just took it all in and then headed back down for some welcomed sandwiches at the base of the peaks.

Listening to: The Needle and Damage Done - Neil Young

After eating, we took a bus ride back up to Devonport and hopped back on the Spirit of Tasmania I for a much tamer trip across the strait to Melbourne.

March 3 (Back on the mainland)

Got into Melbourne at 6am and caught an 830am train to Sydney and got into Sydney at 8:40pm. I credit these marathon train rides with any mental disorders I obtain here. The 14 hour plane flight here was a joke compared to an all day ride on a train. We got into our hostel (Sydney Central YHA) at about 9:30 which is the largest hostel in Australia I believe.

March 4

Spent my first free day in Sydney so far working on the essay that is due soon and our survey project that amounts to no real data or correlation. It is about noon now and we are going to head down to the harbor to see the opera house and everything else. Did the whole tourist thing today, went to the Opera House and the Harbor along with seeing the Botanical Gardens.

Yeah, my hair is getting unruly and no shaving.

Hopefully heading to the Blue Mountains tomorrow before we head to Lismore on another overnight train ride (loosing brain cells) and then into home stays for 2 weeks.

Cheers!
-zuey