{"id":706,"date":"2016-01-02T19:16:26","date_gmt":"2016-01-02T08:16:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/?p=706"},"modified":"2016-01-02T19:16:26","modified_gmt":"2016-01-02T08:16:26","slug":"ahoy-tassie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/?p=706","title":{"rendered":"Ahoy Tassie"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many companies shutdown completely over Christmas in Australia. When I\u00a0found out my company would be closed from 21 December through 3\u00a0January, Jon and I started planning a trip. We’d heard nothing but\u00a0positive things about Tasmania so that became our focus. After some\u00a0research, Jon proposed we take the ferry over because we could bring\u00a0ourselves and our car for less than it would cost to fly and rent a\u00a0car. It sounded like a great idea at the time.\"Ferry\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The trip did not get off to a smooth start when we went to drive to\u00a0the ferry only to find ourselves stuck in a long line of traffic to\u00a0get to the port. According to the rules, we needed to be checked in at\u00a08:15 am, but we were still barely moving forward at 8:15. Luckily\u00a0(sort of), the boat did not leave without us. We settled in for our 9+\u00a0hour cruise over to Tassie. I found much of the trip nauseating and\u00a0spent lots of time head down, eyes closed, trying to get through the\u00a0rough parts. Luckily, I felt much better toward the end of the trip
\nand was able to enjoy our arrival.<\/p>\n

We drove off the ship around 7 pm and headed to Sheffield, our first\u00a0destination, arriving just before 8 pm. It seemed like a good time to\u00a0get settled in and then head out for dinner. It stays light until\u00a0after 9 pm and 8 pm doesn’t seem all that late anyway, but when we got
\nto the hotel, the manager advised that we get dinner straight away\u00a0before everything closed imminently. Sheesh. We managed to get some\u00a0really good Chinese take away and then got settled in at the hotel.<\/p>\n

The next day we headed to Cradle Mountain, planning to hike to the\u00a0summit.\u00a0After some initial confusion, we caught a bus to the start of\u00a0the hike.<\/p>\n

\"Bus<\/a><\/p>\n

We thought it would be best if we could drive straight to\u00a0the car park where the hike starts, but there is a weird metering\u00a0system that lets cars into the park in a seemingly random fashion. We\u00a0were so glad we ended up catching the bus though because the road past
\nthe metering gate is basically one lane with some areas for moving\u00a0over perilously if a car or bus happens along going the other way.<\/p>\n

The hike starts at Dove Lake with a lovely path around the lake.\u00a0\"Dove<\/a><\/p>\n

About half way around, we turned off to start the upward ascent and kept\u00a0going up and going up further with a few reprieves. The path started\u00a0to get a bit more treacherous and I started to get a bit (read: a\u00a0lot!) more anxious as we got closer to the summit. After I tried to\u00a0scramble up a rock the length of me, I decided I’d had enough and told\u00a0Jon to go on to the summit without me.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Cradle<\/a> \"Cradle<\/a> \"Cradle<\/a>\"Cradle<\/a><\/p>\n

There were plenty of people on\u00a0the trail so it seemed safe enough to split up for just a bit. Jon,\u00a0being the overachiever that he is, made it to the summit and back in\u00a0just a bit more time than it took me to get back to a good sitting\u00a0rock area. He reported that it only got worse the rest of the way so\u00a0I’d made a good decision to stop when I did. Phew. I really enjoyed\u00a0vast majority of the hike and the views throughout were really\u00a0amazing.<\/p>\n

\"Cradle<\/a> \"Cradle<\/a><\/p>\n

That night we checked out the Sheffield Hotel and indulged in some\u00a0extra healthy parmas. In Australia, a common bar food is chicken\u00a0parmesan. BUT it isn’t the chicken parm Americans are used to with red\u00a0sauce and cheese and pasta on the side. It comes in all sorts of\u00a0varieties and it is always served with chips (fries). Jon’s parma had\u00a0bacon, egg, cheese, and bbq sauce. Mine was topped with prawns and\u00a0scallops in a cream sauce. Yum. The restaurant had a salad bar too…\u00a0that’s right a salad bar! I haven’t seen a salad bar in a restaurant\u00a0in ages, but someone did warn me if the perception is that Australia\u00a0is generally 10 – 20 years behind the US then Tassie is at least 30\u00a0years behind.<\/p>\n

Our evening entertainment for the rest of the trip was determined that\u00a0night as we caught the Big Bash League<\/a> on TV. It’s a format of cricket\u00a0called T-20 (the first T stands for 20) which turns the game into\u00a0something that lasts a few hours with lots of action. Some Aussies\u00a0seem to like it, but lots of people tsk tsk that isn’t not the way the\u00a0game is meant to be. I think it’s great, but I suspect that’s because\u00a0it’s being Americanized.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned for more on Tassie next time when we head to Hobart…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Many companies shutdown completely over Christmas in Australia. When I\u00a0found out my company would be closed from 21 December through 3\u00a0January, Jon and I started planning a trip. We’d heard nothing but\u00a0positive things about Tasmania so that became our focus. After some\u00a0research, Jon proposed we take the ferry over because we could bring\u00a0ourselves and our … Continue reading Ahoy Tassie<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=706"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/706\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":719,"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/706\/revisions\/719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.handelblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}