Honeymoon: Phase Four: Being Tourists

We drove back to the town of Bicheno, where we picked up some food and a phone card. We continued going north because we had to go to Natureworld. This is not usually my style to go check out animals in captivity, but Jacqueline really wanted to learn about all of the animals. So we paid our $16 apiece, not cheap, and we were now in Natureworld. The coolest thing to see was of course the Tasmanian Devil. It looks very little like Taz from the Looney Tunes, but I guess it is close enough considering that Bugs Bunny doesn’t look like many rabbits I have seen either. They were funny creatures and they seemed to spend a lot of time running around in circles inside of their cages. We checked out the wombats which were giant hamster looking things. There were many birds around also including many varieties of parrots. We learned the difference between the three levels of kangaroos. Pademelons were the smallest, next came the wallabies, and the largest was the kangaroo. We got to check all of them out and Jacqueline really enjoyed the kangaroos. She was upset that we had not purchased the food with which to feed them and they seemed to be upset about it also. The kangaroos were just hanging out in the lawn enjoying their monotonous life in captivity. We left from there and headed back down south before turning and going back north. We were taking faster roads on this day as we had to get back up to Devonport sometime before 6pm tomorrow. We had our first poor experience with a place as we stopped in Campbell Town for lunch. We had an incredibly difficult time finding a spot to eat and then once we did, it took forever for us to get our food, which tasted pretty bad. We also tried to get some money from the ATM and they kept my card because it was worn. This frustrated me pretty good, but luckily they gave it back to me. We happily left there and drove the A1 up north. This was their version of a freeway, but sadly Highway 9 between Zion and La Verkin is a much better road than even their nicest road in Tasmania. We eventually cut west and it took us to the town of Deloraine, where we planned to find accommodation for the evening. We ended up landing at a motel that we just referred to as Settlers. It was a comfortable spot and we were both thrilled to take a shower and get the sand from our backpack out of our hair. We went to Settlers Restaurant which was attached to the motel. The food was really good and it was all made and served in pioneer style from the 1800s. It was not inexpensive, but to have a hearty meal was exactly what we desired. We spent the rest of the evening doing laundry and just hanging out together in the room. In the morning, we got ourselves going early. We drove into town and took care of things on the internet and had some pastries for breakfast. Then we drove out to Mole Creek, which was only half an hour away. This was where the caves were that we were hoping to get in on a tour to see. We bought our tickets and took the rainforest walk up to the cave entrance. This was where we saw this huge bright yellow worm. Usually smart people would think that yellow is a good color to warn off predators, so I should probably leave it alone. Instead I touched it and it was really sticky. Later, we found out it was a carnivorous worm, so I felt rather bright for touching it. We wandered on up to the cave entrance where we had to wait for some time before our tour guide showed up. He gave us the usual cave speech about, don’t touch anything, stalagmites and stalactites, etc… and we wandered on into the cave. Even at the entrance, the cave felt unique considering that it had a river pouring out of it. This would be the third cave that I got to go through that had a river, but this one had all these big chunks of rocks from the past when there was major glaciers in this part of the world. The first fun thing he showed us was a giant cave spider. It was huge as it was about the size of Jacqueline’s hand. Maybe I have been on too many cave tours, but they all are the same. We learn about the people who found the cave. We learn how they used to have to use candle light to find their way. We turn of all the lights and experience complete darkness, but with other people around, never complete silence. The formations are crazy with lots of straws coming down from the ceiling and huge stalactites and stalagmites sometimes merging to make columns. We ended the tour with an overlook of a large gorge with a river running beneath us. On the way back, we got to see the glowworms, which were one of the major attractions for us. These are a larval version of a mosquito that hangs from the ceiling. The hungrier they get, the brighter they glow. They eat the adult version of the mosquito which basically either gets eaten or mates and dies. They spend most of their lives as the larval form glowing at the roof of a cave. We were able to turn out the lights and see about a hundred little lights looking like stars on the ceiling. We were not allowed to take pictures, though. We exited the cave after that and Jacqueline somehow convinced me that we needed to go to the wildlife park that was nearby again. This was a different one from Natureworld, but along the same premise. It must be our honeymoon or my constant desire to see my wife happy and smiling. This time she made sure to buy the feed to give to the kangaroos. The first thing that she got to do was hold a wombat. She talked the staff into having someone come out to show her the wombat and let her hold it. Its name was Nugget and it was a young one, which was good because the adults weigh the same as Jacqueline. This place seemed to be a little trashier than Natureworld, but it was fun to see the Tasmanian devils rip into some fresh road kill. The one exhibit that was nicer was the koala exhibit as it had much more freedom in its eucalyptus habitat than the ones we saw before. We had to wander on quite a bit of land to locate the kangaroos and when we did, they did not seem too concerned with us. Jacqueline made sure to get them to eat, but there did not seem to be too much begging at this place. We had to get out of there by three and it left us with very little time to check into our bed and breakfast, go grocery shopping for our backpack, and drop off the Getz, but we pulled it off. We had to find a place to eat in Devonport and my beautiful bride was in the mood for a pub. When we found the Irish pub, we knew we had the right spot. We got ourselves a beer and ordered the Fisherman’s Platter. This was a meal for two filled with just about any kind of seafood that we could imagine. It was the most expensive thing on the menu, which frankly, I do not think I have ever ordered the most expensive thing on the menu in my life. We ate it all, though, as everything was so good considering that we were so close to the ocean. We cannot get seafood like that in Utah. We walked back to our bed and breakfast, where we spent most of the rest of the evening packing for our trip up to Cradle Valley and the subsequent backpack we would be embarking upon on the Overland Track.

Honeymoon: Phase Three: Freycinet

I got Jacqueline up early, which usually is not an easy task. It was helped by the fact that we were not on Tasmania time quite yet. We got ourselves packed up for a backpack that we were planning to do in Freycinet National Park. It was only about an hour from where we stayed the night. The coast was beautiful as there were miles of beautiful beaches. Finding Jacqueline breakfast became a difficult task. She was not hyped about a place that we stopped at in Scamander, so we had to make a detour out to St. Marys to find her food. This turned out to be a slow trip, as it led us up a winding, steep road. We found her some food which was not much better than the previous spot. One thing that irks me about Tasmania is that they don’t give prices for food at all of their cafes/takeaways. Thus we end up paying way too much for some cheaply made, unhealthy food. Back on track, we went back down another steep, winding road. This lead us to Bicheno where Jacqueline saw a place called Natureworld. I would not stop even though she wanted to go. We had bigger fish to fry on this day. We continued out until the turnoff for Coles Bay showed up. We took that road which lead us to Freycinet National Park. We stopped at the visitor centre to pick up our National Park Pass and get some information. Still confused when we left, we headed out to the trailhead. Here we were supposed to find all of the trails. The one we wanted to take out to Hazards Beach just did not seem to be showing up. We should have stuck to our guns and kept going the way we began. Instead we wasted a lot of time wandering around looking for the trailhead. Eventually we just decided to head up toward the Lookout of Wineglass Bay and use that trail instead. We were not too excited about it, because there seemed to be a lot of people around. I assured Jacqueline that the numbers would die off, but she was none too excited about hauling a heavy pack around all of these people. We both made good time getting up to the Lookout. Jacqueline was a bit grumpy about it, but I convinced her to go out and check out Wineglass Bay. It was awesome. I don’t mean to sound cheesy, but “I never saw blue like that before.” (Song from our wedding) It was an impressive site and we would make sure to remember it by taking fifteen pictures or so on this weekend. We dropped back down and it was nice to be going downhill after the haul uphill to get to the Lookout. We were unable to go fast very long as a group of five people were in front of us going slow. We would continue to have issues with slow folks not letting us pass when hiking the whole trip. We followed these people for a good five minutes until I had to ask to see if we could pass. The guy said, “Passed by a guy with a big pack” as if in shame. I wonder how he felt to see my 98 pound wife hauling 1/3 of her body weight right behind me. We made it down to Wineglass Bay, but we left that for another day. We took the Isthmus Track that would lead us over to Hazards Beach. Here we finally got away from all the people and we seemed to have the place to ourselves. After less than an hour of walking, we popped out at Hazards Beach. We sat down to have some lunch. One problem with Tasmania is their lack of bagels. This trip it did not seem to matter as we had some cheese foccacia rolls filled with meat and cheese. They were good. Hazards Beach was awesome. The waves were crashing away on the shore and the beach was filled with large, multicolored shells. Jacqueline was very excited and she stopped frequently as we walked down the beach to check out the shells. We walked to the end of Hazards Beach which sent us into the woods. One thing I noticed was that it was very warm in the woods, whereas on the beach it was a bit chilly. It did not bode well for my swimming prospects. I was determined though, because we needed to do a little bit of swimming on this trip. We were in the woods and eventually it shot us out at the head of Cooks Beach. This was our final destination for the evening. We still had a walk and seeing the footprints on the shore, we figured that we were going to have some company this evening. We also had company on our walk from a little black and white bird with an orange beak called an Oystercatcher. We got to the campsite and Jacqueline was none too pleased to see that our neighbors were women about our age. They seemed to be unconcerned with us, though, and we gave them plenty of distance as we found a nice spot to camp with a great view of the water. We saw our first wallaby in the campsite. We thought it was a kangaroo because they look very similar. It had a baby in the pouch and we made sure to take tons of pictures. It seemed to notice us, but not really be very scared. This was a bad sign of things to come. Once the tent was set up, I was determined to get in the water. It was not incredibly warm, but it was not insanely cold either. I got in and it was not too deep. I wandered out a long way and it only got about waist deep. I convinced Jacqueline to get in. That was a good idea because my wife looks hot in a swimsuit. I kept her out there for quite some time and I even got up the nerve to get in over my head. We finally retreated when Jacqueline yelled that there was something big swimming towards me. I looked over and sure enough, there was a large dark shadow coming my way. I retreated and although we did not get a good look, both of us think that it was a sting ray. We got ourselves back in warmer clothing and we made ourselves some dinner. This was when the wallabies came out in force. Soon, our campsite was surrounded by wallabies. While trying to make dinner, I also had to fend off the intruders. Jacqueline was much too sweet to them. I made sure to chase them and give them a bit of a swat on the butt. They always went just far enough to be out of the way, but not far enough to miss out on any eating opportunities. We finished dinner and decided that our legs were still in good enough shape to keep walking. We were a bit nervous about leaving the tent, but the wallabies had not seemed dangerous, so we took the risk. There was another beach, Bryans Beach, that was a little under an hour away. This trail was much like the others that we were on during the day, except this time we did not have our full packs on. Thus we could enjoy the scenery much more. The trees were still so funky looking and the track was very easy to walk on. Here we saw a wild wallaby which was far more exciting. Bryans Beach was much like the beach we were already at and we stayed for only a matter of minutes. It was just fun to walk and not have the heavy pack on. We did not want to miss out on opportunities to enjoy this trip, so I was glad we wandered out there. When we returned, another couple had shown up to the campsite and they were sitting on the beach with a blanket with a wallaby sitting right on the corner. We were not as nice as both of us have the belief that wildlife should be wild. When a wallaby showed up right at the front of our tent, I gave it a small bonk on the head with an empty water bottle to let it know that its behavior was unacceptable. It took a minute to figure out what was going on, but it scampered away quickly. I think it was a little too used to using its cuteness to get food and had not expected another greeting. We slept that blissful sleep of a calm night after a hard working backpack, but awoke in the morning to more miles to march. We went back up Cooks Beach and this time took a different trail that would lead us uphill to the mountainous part of the peninsula. It was arduous hiking, but the scenery was fantastic as it was hard not to enjoy the eucalyptus trees. Eventually, we came to saddle where we threw our packs down to climb to the top of Mt. Freycinet. It felt so much easier without the heavy weights dragging us down, even though we were going uphill at a lot steeper rate. The trail became difficult to find in spots, but luckily they had orange markers on the trees to direct us. We spotted another unique Tasmanian wild animal. Later, we would learn the name was an echidna. It looks like a cross between a porcupine and a hedgehog. It was quick to hide itself, so we left it alone and scrambled to the summit. There was only one spot right near the end that took a little maneuvering to get up. Jacqueline handled it fine and we were rewarded with a magnificent view. From one side we could see Wineglass Bay and from the other, the rest of the Peninsula which was a lot more wild even then the places we were lucky enough to see. We trudged back down and Jacqueline spotted a blue-tongue lizard which was rather huge. We got to throw our packs back on after lunch and go right back to going uphill. This led us to Mt. Graham. The views from there were also spectacular, but not as great as the top of Freycinet. We dropped back down after this and would continue descending until we hit Wineglass Bay. This was a much more difficult day than expected, as usually when backpacking along the beach, we do not expect to gain 2000 feet and then have to drop it again. It lead us down to Wineglass Bay and though we knew our car was only an hour and a half away, we decided to make camp for the night. We tried to find a spot where the mosquitoes would leave us alone, but unfortunately could not escape them on this night. They were not bad when it was windy, but once the sun went down, the only way to be outside was to be moving. We only had two wallabies to keep us company for dinner on this night and we thought we might have the beach to ourselves, but some high school kids showed up as the evening wore on. We walked the beach and it was very enjoyable to have this time to spend with my wife. We had no choice but to chill in the tent for the evening as the mosquitoes were relentless outside. I got Jacqueline out of bed early in the morning, because the sky was starting to look like rain. I figured it would be more fun to walk out before the rain came down. It took us about the hour and a half that we were planning. It was good to get back to the Getz and head off to our next adventure.

Honeymoon: Phase Two: Bay of Fires

Once we picked up the Getz, we headed into downtown Devonport. We parked and walked down to a coffee shop where we got some breakfast. We made our way back to the car, picked up the stove canisters, and were off. First we had to head to the Tamar Valley to do some wine tasting. This is a little out of my element. Jacqueline was excited about it, but I did not care much. We were so blown away on the drive by all the vegetation. It was green and there was so much water around. Supposedly it rains 300 days out of the year in Tasmania. It was beautiful, though slightly overcast on this day. We stopped to take some pictures, but the beauty was more in the whole environment rather than in a specific site. There were fields of poppies all around us and we read later that Tasmania produces 40% of the world’s poppies. It was less than an hour to get to the Tamar Valley. We stopped at the first winery that we found. It was rather early being 10am. This made us feel a little awkward to taste wine. I pretty much just let Jacqueline do the work. Eventually, we bought two bottles of wine, which made Jacqueline happy and the wine tasting was over. We thought we might get vineyard tours or something, but the whole wine tasting experience is odd. If someone asked me to go strawberry tasting, I would be like, “That tastes like a strawberry.” I am not sure why wine is so different. Plus I don’t even really like wine that much. Oh well, we moved on and in Launceston we got lunch and some groceries for the week. When leaving Launceston, the roads suddenly got crazy. They took us up steep hills and around many winding curves. We constantly questioned whether we were on the right track, because these were supposed to be major roads. We finally figured out that their major roads took us to scenic spots and through winding crazy areas. After driving a few hours, we found ourselves at the Weldborough Pass Rainforest Walk. It was only fifteen minutes, so we figured this was a good way to stretch our legs. The vegetation was awesome. There were huge ferns and great big trees. It was nice to be in a dense forest again. Back in the car and our drive took us to St. Helens. Here we had accommodation for the night at the Sweetwater Villas. The owner did not seem too concerned with us and gave us the room. It was an apartment style place. We quickly got our stuff in and got ourselves out as we headed out to the Bay of Fires just north of St. Helens. We parked and the first thing that we noticed was that there was no one else here. The beach was beautiful. The sand squeaked under our feet as we walked. The water was beautiful turquoise and the air was just warm enough to be in shorts and short sleeves. We walked the whole beach. The only other persons that we saw were locals including a guy with a pit bull who ran right up to us. It was the first of many that we would see as this seems to be a popular breed in Tasmania. What I thought was interesting was that the algae on the rocks was orange, which I had not witnessed before. It was a very good way to spend the late afternoon as it was such a nice walk along that beach. We worked up an appetite and since we had a kitchen, we cooked ourselves our own dinner. We made Alfredo pasta with calamari. It was very scrumptious. We walked down to the paved walk by the bay near our villas after dinner. It was chillier now and I got in some rock skipping, before we went back to the room. It was a great first day and we were excited for what tomorrow would bring.