Back in Melbourne

Location: Melbourne Cyber Lounge Elizabeth St
Weather: Sunny and Warm

Well I decided to stay in Tasy a bit longer than planned, flew back from Launceston yesterday, after spending a few days in Hobart and 5 days driving around in an automatic 1980's Toyota Corona! reminded me a lot of my first car, most excellent. First day I drove 20kms along a loose gravel road, stones flying everywhere, almost killing the car's suspension and writing off the windscreen to get to the most southern part of Tasy, Cockle Creek and Hastings Cave on the way. Even better in this remote area I almost ran out of petrol (the empty light went on!) and I had to coast down several hills to make it another 25kms or so to a petrol station at 6.40pm, just in time, since they all close at 7pm! I also went on 2 scary ghost tours, one at Port Arthur prison and one in Launceston (Australia's 3rd oldest city). Saw little penguins at fantastic Bicheno beach, was staggered by the biggest waves I've ever seen at the amazing Wineglass Bay (definitely one of the world's top 10 beaches, I did try to swim there but it was a bit mental) at Freycinet National Park, visited a Tasy Devil park (they get very excited at feeding time and it is not recommended to try to pat them unless you want your hand bitten off) and saw some very tall trees and waterfalls at Mt Field national park. Being a nutter I slept in the car for 4 days out of 5 and had to drive back to Hobart on the 2nd day to buy a sleeping bag after finding the temperature drops to below zero in the mornings! hooray!
In Launceston I had a go at cable hang-gliding - basically you get strapped to a hang glider and speed over a cliff for 20 seconds attached to a cable! see http://www.cablehanggliding.com.au

I also discovered a great new game called Possum Squash! you drive along at high speed in the pitch dark (there are no street or house lights in most of Tasmania), headlights full on and try to run over as many possums as possible! The locals are very good at this, judging by the amount of roadkill about and because the poor things don't actually run away from cars and the brakes on the Toyota Corona were non-existant, I too found it very hard to dodge them!

All in all, Tasmania - land of the people with 2 heads (as the mainland Aussie's say), is an awesome place, I recommend it to anybody, I would've stayed longer if I could! But now I'm back in Melbourne until Friday or Saturday to see the Grand Prix, then I'm off to Canberra!

By JamesReed on 02.03.04 @ 09:49 AM GMT