On the Road Again

Historic Richmond Bridge, AD1835

Spot the Thylacine

This is how OAPs spend their days

Tassie's bounty

Heading for first swim, Oatlands

Callington Mill, Oatlands, built 1836, restored 2010

A sad reflection of small business in Tassie today

Battery Point panorama

I guess most of you will be aware that Ray had to return to Brisbane in November for a second prostate operation and subsequent recovery, but for those of you who have wondered who, what, when, where and why, Ray has now “done his time”.  He has rested, recovered his fitness, and we are back in Tasmania to pick up where we left off.

We picked the motorhome up from its storage home last Wednesday and spent the rest of that day, and all of the following, cleaning up, clearing out, and restocking, at Barilla Holiday Park.  We now have a clean van, a full fridge, and 3 bags of clothes destined for Vinnies! 

One of Katrina’s friends was also in Hobart at the same time, so we all met at the Customs House Hotel, one of the original stone hotels near Constitution Dock, and enjoyed a couple of drinks and lunch on a beautiful sunny day.  A walk around beautiful Battery Point followed, and a stroll around the city before our OAP $2.20 bus ride back to Barilla late afternoon.

This is a long weekend in southern Tasmania for the Hobart Regatta weekend, so it seemed a good time to high tail it north for a bit of breathing space.  We travelled via Richmond, which is normally extremely busy with tourists photographing the beautiful old stone bridge, which incidentally is the oldest bridge in Australia, convict built or otherwise.  A coffee and a scallop pie at the excellent Bakery in the middle of “town” and we were off on a secondary road to Oatlands, where we saw only about 5 cars on the 1 hour trip. 

Half way along the Mud Walls road we saw a sign pointing to a farmhouse selling cherries and apricots, so naturally we took it, and found a little treasure.  Big black cherries at $10 a kilo, local sweet apricots for $8 and home made ice cream in small containers, both cherry and apricot.  Ray goes for cherry and I love apricot, so we had one of each (well, actually we still have another cherry in the freezer) and delicious they all were too.

Here we are, parked by Lake Dulverton with only 4 other vans nearby in a large area, and the lake, although the water level is very low, is filled with black swans, geese, ducks, coot and grebes.  We were delighted to see a mother duck leading her 9 ducklings to the lake this morning, presumably for their first swim.  Goodness knows where they hatched – they waddled down the middle of the hilly road which leads to Callington Mill, and luckily had the road to themselves for the time it took to reach the lake.

We intended to get the bikes off the back for a ride around the lake and up the long main street today, but it’s blowing a gale, with gusts up to 40 knots (80 km/hr).  It’s also unseasonably hot, at 31 degrees, which the locals assure us will keep everyone away.  You could have shot a cannon up the main street this morning and not hit a soul!  I thought perhaps everyone had gone to Hobart for the Regatta, but evidently the locals head up to the lakes, which we may do ourselves if the weather doesn’t cool down.  Evidently Dago Lake is the one to go to! 

We’ll have another day here before taking another leap into the unknown.  There are so many places to go, so much to do.  Plus daughter Ingrid arrives on the 26^th for a 10 day stay so we’re looking forward to showing her around.  Cousins Iris and John also arrive on the 26^th and are hiring a camper van as well, so party time in Tassie!