Homeward Bound

Our last day in Tassie.

In February, at our annual girl's weekend, my friend Lyn, who is Taswegian by birth (and has the scar on her neck from the removal of her second head to prove it), wrote me some notes about what we should see in Tassie. The notes were on incredibly small note paper (my fault, not Lyn's), but I did manage to get them out from time to time and review them. She had written that we should visit Pennyroyal in Launceston. Well - it turns out we were booked in to Pennyroyal apartments for our last night in Tasmania. But it was serendipity, not in any way planned.
This building with it's waterwheel was dismantled and taken to Launceston and rebuilt. It was a tourist attraction of some sort at one time, however it is now a pub and hotel and serviced apartments etc..

 Anyway we checked out of our room and hit the road. First stop Deloraine, where we found ourselves another Melbourne Cup winning horse - well a statue of it anyway. It's name was Malua, and if you want to know any more than that you will have to ask Ray because that's all I know!

Something Delaoraine had that was breathtaking was a display call Yarns. It is a series of four silk panels depicting the history culture of the town.
The idea came from a theatre curtain in Griffith NSW (which is also breathtaking).
The four panels in Deloraine took 300 women 3 years to make.
I haven't shown them all here, just small parts of them that had an impact on me.

Tasmanian Devils peeking out of some foliage...

This is one whole panel depicting the natural history of the area...

And last, but never least the inevitable Tasmanian Tigers...

Deloraine also had a fantastic social history museum. Very very comprehensive. I took a fancy to this doll's house...

And tried to imagine cooking the perfect steak with this..... I image the little basin/cup in the handle is to collect the fat????

And how different is this cake mixer to the Thermomix!!!

There was an aquaphone in the outdoor area of the museum, we had to use the sound to locate it.

Quite fascinating!

When we got back to the building one of the ladies from visitor information took the time to point out some of the buildings that feature in the silk panels that could be seen from the centre. She and Ray had already had a light-hearted 'discussion' about Melbourne Cup winners so they were firm friends!

We left the visitor info centre bound for a 1950's style lunch. Actually the menu was really 2012 - although they did have malt for their milkshakes (Yummy!).

The decor was 1950's. I thought we would get served by a girl on roller skates!
There was 50s vintage memorabilia everywhere. Collections of toy cars and petrol bowsers and engine oil bottles and cans - it was almost too much. Unfortunately the owner does not allow photographs inside, so if it is of any interest, I'll be bringing home a post card.Great maze in the front though, and there is a topiary teapot and cup that is apparently a fountain!

 

Our next stop was a town called Sheffield where there is a department store that still has an old fashioned "flying fox" for payment. The money you proffer is sent to the accounts office via the "fox" and the change sent back down to the counter. The other thing that I noticed when we went in was that they still had all their original counters and your senses were immediately assaulted by the smell of furniture polish. I didn't take any photos inside as it was just toooooo crowded with stock.

More importantly than department stores, Sheffield is the town of murals. There are 48 murals in the town and more dotted around the area.
Just one of the many...... note the clever inclusion of the shadow of a tourist taking a photo.  :-)

From Sheffield to Wilmot, which is a quite small village, they do boast a museum, which we didn't go in.

We were actually on the "mail box trail" There are dozens of novelty mailboxes on the roads leading to Wilmot - great fun!

And of course the inevitable Tasmanian Tiger......

and there was a some beautiful scenery along the way...

The last place we went to in Tasmania (other than the Ferry Wharf in Devonport) was like  no where else.

In fact, it was soooooooo much like no where else that it was.................

see you all on the mainland!!

Launceston & The Tamar

We left the Pennyroyal in search of a cafe for some breakfast.
If it got to 9am we were also searching for a place to buy a charger for two mobile phones, one ipod and an e-reader! the last one got left in Bicheno.
Found a cafe and got directions to "Hardly Normal", but couldn't find it.
We gave up and set out for the docks where we going to begin our luncheon cruise of the Tamar.
On the way we found these Tasmanian Tigers. Yes - the living, breathing ones may well be extinct, but trust me, there are many, many other varieties to be found down here.

We made it to the wharf with 40 minutes to spare and discovered that Harvey Norman was just across the road.
Done!!

There were only 15 people on the cruise, so it was very cosy.
Unfortunately the very strong, but warm wind that we had woken up to had now turned a little cooler and decidedly wet!
Never mind.....

The boat went into the Cataract Gorge, which I was very happy about as I had been very curious about this as it is so close to the city. We more or less entered the gorge as we went under this bridge

There was something 'hysterical' about this house, but I can't remember what it was, however if you can make out the wire fence below the house (I think there is a person standing there too) you are looking at a walk that stretches along the gorge. It is lit until midnight. Fantastic. i imagine it would be a great walk.

There are some lovely Victorian and Federation style houses on the hillside that slopes down toward the estuary.

Please note that I called the Tamar an estuary. Even though lots of people refer to it as a river it isn't. It's the longest navigable estuary in Australia.

If you can make out the grandstand in this photo then I can tell you it is used as a grandstand for regattas and the like, but it's primary role is as a levee bank to save Launceston from flooding.

Spot the sea eagle............

Somewhere along the Tamar this church appeared. It was built privately by the owner of the land to appease his wife and keep the peace after moving to the area. Apparently it worked because they had 11 kids.

The cruise went as far as the Batman Bridge. I recall thinking as I drove over this bridge yesterday that it was a bit odd - asymmetric.
There's a reason for that. apparently on one side the bank is rock and on the other soft soil. The bridge was designed so that the rocky side takes three quarters of the burden of the bridge.

On the way back Mr. S. Eagle has been joined by the Mrs.

Ray also spotted some Boobies. No - that is not a reference to anything other than feathered wildlife!

This boat, in spite of looking pretty ordinary in this photo, has a very famous relative. It's called the Wyuyna and it has been said that it is a copy of the Royal Yacht Britannia. In actual fact it was built at exactly the same time as the Britannia, pretty much side by side in the ship yard, so it can't be a copy. What's more the Wyuna's plans were drawn up earlier than those for the Britannia, so it seems the Wyuna can lay claim to having been copied by the Britannia!!

Launceston was once called Pattersonia, named by a bloke called Patterson who was given a very large land grant here. There is still a place called Pattersonia nearby, but it is much smaller than Launceston.

There was some lovely landscapes along both sides of the Tamar, but it was rather wet and rather cold and we retreated to a warmer part of the boat that was not conducive to taking photos.

Back on dry land we visited the Old Umbrella Shop, then retreated to the warmth and comfort of a hotel room for our last night in Tasmania.

Scottsdale and Up Hill and Down Dale and....

Whew what a day!!!

We began with a 10 minute drive north to Bridport. Someone had recommended that we go there, but we aren't sure why. There were a couple of nice little beaches............

The next stop was George Town, which is one of Tassie's oldest towns. They have 3 different museums/displays relating to the history of the town. Firstly  a museum in the town in the old watch house, that has been restored to it's original state for the purpose. It featured a model of the old town, and we were treated to a comprehensive rundown of the history.

They also pointed out the buildings from the original settlement that are still in existence.

We moved on from there to go to a Bass and Flinders Exhibit.

This featured information about the lives and times of both Bass and Flinders, who circumnavigated Tasmania and proved that it was an island.

There was a replica of the Norfolk (which included Matthew Flinders' Cat!) and also one of the

Tom Thumb.

 From there we drove out to the actual coast where the pilot man's cottages have been restored and one is a cafe, some are accommodation and one is a very comprehensive maritime museum.

It seems Ray missed his calling - here is is behind the wheel again.

From there we went south and then across the Batman Bridge to the other side of the Tamar and north again to Beauty Point to the Platypus House.

This was fabulous. The facility has a licence for 5 platypuses (yes that is the correct term for the plural), although they only have 4 at the moment. They are attempting to breed them.

What fascinated me the most was the fact that they have different habits to the platypuses on the mainland. They are not nocturnal. It seems they actually have different DNA so are actually a small sub species.

Very cute - it was hard to take photos with no flash, but we got a couple of  almost reasonable ones in the end. These two pictures (if you can see them) are of Porky. Porky's a bit of a geriatric apparently. A bit slow and keeps bumping into things.

Platypuses close everything when they go underwater - eyes, mouth, nose and ears. So they find their way and their food via sensors (I forget what they are called) in their bill.

 This is what they eat.......... Live!! and guess where I was standing............ I was keeping my eye on them!

One of the most surprising things was the size of their eggs. They are roughly the size of a jaffa - they aren't orange of course - they are white, and they only lay up to three of them.

Next stop the Echidna Garden. Echidnas are the only close relatives of Platypuses. Monotremes. Mammals, but they lay eggs. Apparently their skeletons are identical.

These guys were so cute! They are also slightly different to the ones on the mainland, but that just seems to relate to climate. These appear to have smaller ratio of spines to hair.

Their eggs are much the same size as a platypus, and the young of both animals are called puggles!

So you'd think that we would have had enough of unusual creatures...... Think again!!

Seahorse world!!

Now these things truly are different! They are bred for the pet industry, although the business started for the Chinese medicine market, but proved not to be a very good earner.

There are quite a lot (I think it was around 60) of different seahorses. Australia has the largest number of any country because we have both cold and warm waters.

Now, there are lots of things to love about seahorses. Firstly they are different and cute - that's good, but what is really awesome is that the female gives the male a little tickle up and basically impregnates him!! You've gotta love that!

In the picture below it is the seahorse with the smaller tummy that is actually carrying babies. The ones with the really big, white looking pouches in the front are actually flirting. Showing the female that they have the capacity to carry the babies! Wouldn't our blokes love it if it was the pot bellies that hooked us in!!

The largest number of babies they have counted from one male is 1166. Read it and weep!! They have to collect the babies as soon as they are born though, because the adults will eat them.

So - day over??? Sorry, not yet.

No creatures this time. Off to Beaconsfield to the Mining Museum. I'm not sure now what it was called, but it was certainly about more than just mining. There were great social history displays as well.

A large number of the mining exhibits, especially the ones with big bits of machinery, are displayed in the ruins of an old mine building.

Let me tell you that at this point I had had enough!!

We finished the day in Launceston at the Pennyroyal (maybe more about that next time). We had one or two (?) drinks in the pub and a lovely dinner before collapsing in a heap in our room.

Bye Bye Bicheno

After spending three nights in a lovely cabin in Bicheno it was time to hit the road again......

On the road again la la la........etc.

On good authority we drove up Elephant's Pass to St Mary's. It was a very windy road climbing quite high, there was not, however, any views at all. Even if there had been somewhere to stop - there was simply nothing to see.

Once we got to St Mary's we then went down St Mary's Pass to the bottom.

Not far away was St Helen's, where we visited the visitor info centre where we found this dragon. This is only about half of him. There was also a museum with artifacts found that had been left behind by Chinese gold miners.

First stop out from St Helen's was Binalong. I think this is the whitest sand I have ever seen! It looked lovely, but we were on the trail of the Bay of Fires, so we turned north..........

..... to The Gardens, where we could view the start of the Bay of Fires. The Bay of Fires is actually a series of bays that stretch along the north east coast for quite a distance. The name comes from the red rocks that line the bays.
Unfortunately we didn't see much evidence of "fires" but it was a lovely area anyway.

 I thought I had a better picture of this, but that rock formation in the distance looks a lot like a fist displaying "the rude finger".......

 

The next detour was to St Columba Falls. These are reputed to be the longest falls in Tassie at 90m. The falls were lovely, but the surroundings were even lovelier.

This was our first look at the falls on the way down......

It felt like you were walking through a forest of Man Ferns, there were much taller trees, of course, but you could barely see them.

It was like a different world, this time rather than looking for dinosaurs, I must confess that I was looking for fairies.....

We did eventually reach the falls......

After our walk through fairyland we stopped off at a cheese factory called.........

Next stop was a very small village where they have what is a very large and impressive memorial.

Many towns in Australia, at the end of WWI, planted trees as memorials to their fallen soldiers, in Legerwood the trees that had been planted in the park had become too big and were becoming dangerous and needed to be removed.
Instead of just chopping them down, an artist/carver was called in. He designed the carvings that he intended to do in each tree and then the trees were cut down to that point. then he began.
It was about 6 months actual worked that was stretched out over a 12 month period.
Each tree is dedicated to a particular person and each have been funded by different bodies. For instance, one was funded by the Department of Veteran's Affairs, one by the family of the soldier, and yet another by a local community organisation, etc..
There are no words to describe how fantastic these things are.......
Two of them have multiple carvings, the rest are single figures......

A fitting end to a fairly long day.

We continued to Scottsdale where we spent the night at

North East Rest A While  B&B

run by Phyllis & Tony