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| Looking over Dove Lake at Cradle Mountain. Monday was a much sunnier day for this photo. |
| Glenn's Journals 12-22-02 12-23-02 Tasmania We awoke this morning having froze our butts off last night. It was cold during the night and the day had started out as very overcast, dreary, wet, and with no sunshine in sight. We took it slow this morning hoping that the sun would peak out through the clouds and that the rain and wind would stop, or at least slow down. Well, by noon the day had not gotten any brighter so we decided to head out for our hike anyway. We would shorten up the hike and wear raingear and other appropriate gear, including longjohns (it was that cold). We drove the 2 kilometers to the entrance to Cradle Mountain National Park where we ran into no other but Marcel and Eveline. We agreed to hike together as we were going on the same trail anyway. Erin and I hiked along the Pencil Pine Trail (15 minute hike return) while Marcel and Eveline had lunch in the car. The hike today was around Dove Lake and was listed at between 1-2 hours. Again, the day was cold, wet, and overcast but we went anyway. The hike was enjoyable as we stopped occasionally to take in the views of Cradle Mountain from the different angles. The trail is very well prepared and easy to get around. We spent 2 hours walking around the lake including taking pictures of us and our friends. We were back in the car around 4:30 pm and returned to Pencil Pine Falls to take photos of Marcel and Eveline to send to them (and use on our website). Once we left the park we returned to the cabin where Erin prepared a wonderful meal including chicken cacciatore and pasta. The rest of us relaxed and chatted about our adventures in the past week. After dinner we ventured out of the cabin to see if we could spot some wild life just running around. We walked along the trail and into the woods where we finally spotted a wombat and a wallaby. We later spotted a bandicoot near the cabin. I returned to the cabin around 10:00 pm as I was starting to chill. We all crashed around 11:30 pm where we all froze our butts off during the night. The cabin did have a heater but not one that I would have left on overnight (for safety reasons). 12-23-02 Tasmania Monday is our last day in Tasmania as we are scheduled on the 9:00 pm ferry back to Melbourne tonight. We packed up things and said goodbye to Marcel and Eveline before departing camp around 11:00 am. We planned on seeing Marcel and Eveline again in New Zealand next month. They even presented us with a "nice to get to know you" gift from Switzerland of a swiss army knife. We thanked them for their kindness and said that we would look forward to seeing them again in New Zealand. Our first stop today was at Tasmazia which was once known as the "worlds largest maze complex" with 8 mazes, a lavendar farm, honey boutique, pancake parlour, and the village of Lower Crackpot (A whimsical model villge built to 1/5th scale with it's own post office box). Tasmazia is located in the town of Promised Land with the saying on their merchandise of "I've been to the Promised Land, across the way from Paradise, down the road from No Where-Else, via the Devil's Gate, Tasmania. Our first stop was the pancake parlour where we both tried the strawberry pancakes and they were delicious!!! We then bought stamps at the store so we could mail postcards from the Village of Lower Crackpot before entering the maze area. We spent the next few hours enjoying the 8 different mazes and all they had to offer. It was a fun way to spend a few hours of a day,, especially if you are into puzzles and mazes. Our next stop was the town of Sheffield which is aptly named "the Town of Murals" for their more than 100 murals on the buildings around town. The murals we saw were very well done and made for an interesting talking point. After Sheffield we finished the trip into Devonport where we would catch the ferry later that night. We arrived in town around 4:00 pm so we had time to kill which we did by relaxing along the shore while reading our books. We stopped for dinner around 6:00 pm before getting in line at the ferry terminal at around 7:30 pm. The ferry started to load cars around 8:40 pm and we were on our way a little after 9:00 pm. We spent a few hours reading books before trying to get some sleep in our cruise chairs. We each had less success sleeping tonight as Erin arose around 4:00 am to go write journals while I slept until 5:30 am. |
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| Erin's theme song would be "Big-Haired Girl," rather than "Brown-Eyed Girl" |