Tassie Part 2 - The East Coast

My bus left Hobart around 8:30 am, but I had been in the habit of waking up early. It was the raining, for the first time since I arrived, and Tasmania is known for getting more rain than the mainland. It was quite nice, riding in on the bus in the rain watching the scenery, some of the horses had blankets on. There was thunder and lightening as well, and overall the bus was a good vantage point to sit and watch the rain and the atmospheric conditions that go along with it. I would even say the bus rides were a highlight of the trip. The rain stopped right before reaching my destination of Bicheno, an small port town, and it was dry and sunny when I got off the bus. Bicheno used to be a whaling town, but there aren't many whales left anymore, so now it seems like tourism is one of the big industries here, although according to Lonely Planet, the guidebook, it still is an active port and retains more local character than some of the other east coast towns. There were many visitors, but townsfolk as well, and didn't have too much of a touristy feel, so it was cool.


One of the tourist destinations I went to was the aquarium, which was pretty lame, but I got to see Henry the Octopus (above). They had a variety of different sea creatures, but overall it was a small room with a bunch of small tanks, some of which I'm pretty sure were mislabeled. Although it did have a sort of small town charm to it. There was a sign on the wall thanking the local fisherman for helping with the acquisition of the animals, and the walls were wood grain. I also had the whole aquarium to myself, although it was also connected to a restaurant and gift shop.

This natural tourist attraction above, the blowhole, I had been told about but practically stumbled upon while exploring the rocky shores of the town. The waves hitting the rock weren't all that big but I guess for some reason the force pushes a bunch of water through a crevice or hole so a bunch of water shoots out in once place. Since it was a whaling town, and the rock looks kind of like a whale, I guess it has special significance. I didn't closely inspect it because I didn't want to soaked. Overall I had more fun walking/climbing on the boulders, working my way along the shoreline, than watching the blowhole, although it was a still neat. Its just funny that its one of the things that is listed as an attraction in Lonely Planet and on signs around the town.

This is the public dock, it looks like there is another dock in the background, I don't quite remember. Like I said, this is a small town, so its port obviously doesn't rival Oakland's, or Melbourne's. I just imagined being an old man driving my boat down to launch at five in the morning to go fishing, after just having eaten a bacon and egg sandwich on toast, some crumbs still in my long gray beard, with a cooler with some Cascade Lager (a tasmanian beer) and snacks, meeting up with the boys for a day of chilling on the boat.

The second joke is in the detail, I didn't even realize it until I got home.
Wide, grass sidewalks. There were quite a few bogan-mobiles as well. Bogans are like rednecks, sometimes kind of bro-ish. I don't think I've met any proper bogans yet though. The most bogan of the bogans like to drive suped up trucks.
On top of that hill is Whalers Lookout (might have got the name slightly wrong). From there I got some good views of the area; I'll be adding some more panorama shots soon, from various parts of my trip. In the whaling days, people would stay posted up there to look for whales, but now its more just for people like me.

These were the rocks I was climbing around on. I'm not sure what all the orange is from. After wandering around the town, and checking out various tourist stuff, I went back to check into the hostel (I had already left my stuff there, but hadn't paid and stuff). It was the best hostel I've stayed at yet. The guy who ran it was some nice, mellow dreaded guy who had a dog who also had dreads. The hostel building reminded me of cabins. I didn't have much on the agenda for the night. I had tried to book a spot on the penguin tour, but it was full so I was going to go the next night. I met some German study abroad students who were debating an Aussie girl about vegemite. They couldn't stand the stuff. I enjoy it a bit, it tastes kind of like the powder that comes with ramen, but its in a paste form. Its not my top choice, but its nice to put on some toast or crackers as a snack sometimes. The Aussies grow up with it though, so they've developed a taste for it that seems to be part of their national identity.


The next day I caught a bus early to go to Freycinet National Park, home of Wineglass bay, one of the nicest beaches in the world according to various travel literature. There was only one bus a day going there, and only one coming back, but I had about a six hour time slot to fit my hike into. I hiked up to a lookout point (photo coming soon), which was between two mountain peaks, then headed down to the beach, then cut across the peninsula on a path that went alongside a dried up lagoon, down another beach, and then back around the mountains to the beginning. The mountains were once active volcanoes, so there were lots of rocks around which reminded me of Jurassic Park (see photo a bit below). The beach was fairly nice, really white sand, clear water, friendly wallabys hopping around, they're like mini kangaroos. Your not supposed to feed them, but it seems like some people do, because they come up to you looking for a handout. (I just met with my adviser today and she told me she was sitting on the same beach eating an apple and a wallaby came up and grabbed her arm, wanting some of the apple, and she pulled her arm back and got cut from the animals claws, and it still managed to snatch the apple and run off. They didn't try to pull anything like that with me though, and generally seemed friendly). I encountered them on the beach, at various points along the path, and then again in the parking lot area of the park (parking lots are always referred to as car parks here though).



These are some of the cool, Jurassic park-esque rock formations.

I found a cool fish exo-skeleton on the beach. Below is some of the mountains, as seen across the dried lagoon.


That night, after returning from the hike, I went on the penguin tour. Fairy penguins are the species that live in Australia. It was dark out and you can't use flash photography because it will hurt there eyes, and I'd imagine if you have large groups of tourists freaking out the penguins with bright flashing lights every night, the penguins will avoid returning to the rookery at night. But plenty of photos came up on google, so I attached one below. That night, back at the hostel I hung out with a green haired guy from Denmark who was going to be camping for a few days in Freycinet, and a girl from Melbourne who was cycling up the east coast of Tasmania. I'd imagine biking around Tassie would be pretty cool, its very rural, not too many cars, nice scenery, a fair amount of roadkill in case you run out of money and want some wombat steaks.

The next day I caught the bus to Launceston, the second biggest city in Tassie, where I was changing buses, but had a two hour gap before heading on to Devonport where I was catching the ferry the following day back to Melbourne. I checked around the downtown area of Launceston, got some bangers and mash, then headed to check out the skatepark which wasn't great, but was worth skating. There were lots of bikers there, who seemed to dominate the park a bit. BMXers and skaters get along alright in Oz, I guess they have to since the bikers get to use the skateparks legally. At this park there was some anti-skater graffiti, although it was probably just one kid, and there was even more graffiti that said 'no mountain bikes'. There was a steep, skinny, and sketchy cement ten foot high vert ramp which was kind of cool, but hard to skate.

Afterwards, I caught the bus to Devonport and got in with still a bit of time before I could check into my hostel, so I lugged all my stuff (A full to the brim backpack with jackets tied to the outside, a sleeping bag under my arm) and skated to the skatpark, stopping by the bottleshop on the way. As I was riding through the town I got some funny looks, carrying all my stuff, a bag with some clinking bottles, while skating down the sidewalk, probably looking all dirty too. According to my skatepark guidebook, the park was pretty lame, but upon arriving, I found a lot of unexpected obstacles. Apparently they had just rebuilt the park and opened it two weeks earlier. However, a new park in town meant that it was full of scooter kids. BMXers are more respectable in a way, although scooters aren't as bad because it doesn't hurt as much if you crash with them, and they don't ruin ledges, like pegs do. There were some skaters too though. Also, the big downside was that the bowl was being painted by some "graffiti artists" so it wasn't skateable (if you'll recall, I wasn't able to skate the Bondi Bowl in sydney, a super gnarly pool replica, because of painting as well, although that was just a straight coat of blue). It was still better than I expected, and the bowl looked sort of like a smaller (and less good) version of Fitzi, so I wasn't as heartbroken as I was in Sydney (by the way, in case any of my skater bros want to see what this Bondi pool being shredded, theres a five minute clip of Tony Trujillo killing it on Youtube. I'm sure the locals can skate it well too...). Also, while discussing Americans skating Oz, I was watching the Cardiel documentary the other day and there is a short clip of him skating the Hobart snake run. It where hes talking about going on trips and asking the locals to take them to the old parks no one has seen or something like that, basically the cool old parks that are super gnarly and different is what I gathered.

The next day I sailed from Tassie on a 9 hour boat ride. I did some homework and ate at an overpriced buffet on the boat. There was a small movie theater but it only showed kids movies. I got to stand out on the deck of the boat and watch the Melbourne skyline as we approached. I took the tram back from the port. Walking through downtown to change trams was interesting, because it was saturday night, I had all my stuff, and I was in a busy city environment after having been in away from the city for a week. I had a good trip, and it was relaxing to return to my little room at unilodge.