After two nights in Melbourne, we headed to Tasmania. We did a big circle of Tassie - started in Launceston (North coast), drove around to the Bridestowe Lavender Fields, to Beaumaris (northeast coast), down the east coast to the south at Port Arthur (southeast coast), up through the interior to the west coast at Strahan, back through the interior to Cradle Mountain, then up to the North coast at Stanley, and from there back to Launceston.
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Arrived in Melbourne on Australia Day. We heard there were fireworks, but didn't get down to the river in time. Took pictures from the middle of the road, on the edge of the CBD (Central Business District).
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Flowers and a little cottage at the edge of a city park.
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Downtown Melbourne, taken across the street from the Melbourne Museum.
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The Shot Tower, which used to be a factory that made shot (like for guns); now it's an old tower in the middle of a new mall. Pretty cool and unique.
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Also cool and unique is this giant pocket watch at the Shot Tower. On the hour the middle drops, the birds and players swing back and forth and sing "Waltzing Matilda".
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The next morning, we caught a Quantas flight to Launceston. Not one of these planes, we got what's called a "Dash" plane - small turboprop.
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Bridestowe Lavender Farm. Unfortunately, we'd missed the purple height of lavender season (which is around New Years'), but enjoyed the visit anyway, the pervasive smell of lavender, and the impressive old oak trees.
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There were a couple of sunflowers at Bridestowe as well.
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Something that suprised me the first time I heard of them: Temperate rain forests (like a rainforest in Upstate NY). This was a short 'rainforest walk' we found along the drive.
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These giant ferns definitely made this forest "look" rainforesty.
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It's been very dry in Tasmania, and there's been some big bush fires in the news (more on those later). We don't know where this fire was, but it seemed to be out by the morning.
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A thistle at the overlook where I took the previous picture. I like my new camera :)
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Once we got settled into the Surfside Motel, our home for the night, we went down to the beach. I decided to wander the beach barefoot...
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The beach at the Surfside Motel, near Beaumaris.
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This dog's name is apparently Asha; s/he followed us down to the beach like s/he belonged to us. It was kinda cool, but s/he lost interest after we stopped tossing shells, which were dug around rather than being fetched.
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Beach near Beaumaris. The slightly peach color in the sky is from the bush fire somewhere west of us; this is the east coast of Tasmania
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Morning on the beach, looking the direction we're generally heading today.
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Our footprints on the clean sand, about to be washed away by the surf...
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A bit morbid, but I did find this pufferfish skeleton interesting.
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Morning along a lagoon near Scamander, which suffered pretty badly in the recent bush fires. It's not apparent, but many of these trees are burnt, as are the ones in the distance.
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Nature doesn't take long to recover - the fires were less than a month ago, and already the plants are coming back.
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