.....A Taste of Tasmania.....

Although we had an amazing time on the mainland Australia, we were excited to be finally heading to Tasmania. Our plan was to stay in Tasmania for 1 month despite the shock of most; including the mainlanders, on what we could possibly do for a whole month in Tasmania. As you will see a month is still not enough time - Tasmania is gorgeous!

We arrived in Hobart, Tasmania at around 9:00pm on January 4, 2010. The airport is very small so you can imagine a bit of confusion in the place as a large plane of 100's of people, land. As people rushed around grabbing trolleys, pushing and reaching for their luggage, rubber necking above people's head to see the people they were to meet to take them away and eventually vacating the airport, we continued to stand and wait patiently by the luggage claim belt for our luggage. We waited until the motor of the rotating luggage claim belt shut off. As we stood with only 2 out of our 3 bags, we looked at each other and then looked at the belt one last time. As the motor spit out another pathetic grunt, the belt made it's final movement, and still no more bags in sight - we were not happy. At this time, there was no one left in the airport except 2 or 3 staff and a few people standing in a line in the distance, and it was quiet - I mean really quiet - VERY weird as it is only 9pm - where is everyone? Anyways, as you can quess, Qantas lost one of our bags and heading to our first real tramp; the 7 day Overland Track, in 2 days, we were a bit nervous and anxious as we headed for the dreaded, "Luggage Claim Problem" desk! While in line we did start to make a re-count of things and realized that of all the bags to lose, this one was the best. We still had our knapsacks, all our camping gear, gortex and warm clothing, so really, we could buy everything else. Thinking of the man behind the desk, this wee bit of risk management assessment made his life a whole lot easier! Although one should not "shoot the messenger", it is very hard not to, when there is no one else around! Once we got to the desk, we did the ususal "lost baggage" routine. They would send our bag to us when it arrived. The only problem was we were staying at a hostel in Hobart for 1 night then leaving the next morning for Launceston to meet Danya Sayer; a friend of ours. This did not leave much room for error. After alot of fast thinking, we decided to have them deliver the bag to the hostel and we would come back to get it after the hike as it was in the plan to go back to Hobart after to meet up with friends anyways. Turned out not to be a big deal, but it is still stressful until you fiqure this out! So once we resolved that issue and we could re-focus, we turned around and the airport that was empty at 9pm was now a complete ghost town....seriously, it is only 9:30pm......where is everyone......is there something that everyone else knows that we don't.........?????? We grabbed our bags and started to head out of the airport to get our shuttle ride that the hostel advised us to get, when the one and only man left in the airport; and in Hobart apparently, said, "uh, excuse me, do you have a ride or know where you are going? There are no more shuttles or taxis that will be at the airport tonight." Man, Hobart shuts down early! No more shuttles, no more taxis, but of course, there is always one left that is always ready and willing to rip you off. You know the type, the one that claims that says that we are just lucky that he is still there, and of course he is not working anymore, and he will go out of his way, but because we are desperate he will "do us a favour". Yeah right! Anyways, we did not have a choice and our "one man left", other then this scammer, was absolutely no help, he just avoided eye contact and ignored the situation; he just wanted to go home - to do nothing I guess, since everything in Hobart is shut down*grin*! My excitment of Tasmania quickly turned to dispair, but as I learned along time ago - nothing last forever, not even the bad stuff - and it didn't! So our "rip of artist" taxi driver eventually got us to our hostel, and dropped us off at the locked door. I did have the access code, but between Delia, myself and another quest it still took us 10 minutes to get in the door. There were a few more things that happened, but I will spare you - enough already -we arrived safe and sound and that is all that matters really! We had a great sleep - NEVER underestimate the power of ear plugs - ha - and the next day we were ready to rock and roll! We took the bus (station right across from the hostel - things were already starting to look up) to Launceston and met with Dayna. Dayna is certainly a friend of ours now, but how we got the connection was actually through a friend of ours; Magda, from home. So prior to this day, we did not know Dayna at all.....and this is where the REAL experience of the people of Tasmania started - they truly are fabulous people. We had e-mailed back and forth so Dayna knew generally what are plans were, but she went above and beyond and made our trip so much easier and better. So what would have been a logistical nightmare getting around and lugging all our stuff around and taking much, much longer, in a matter of an hour or two, we had everything that we needed. We would stay one night with her parents then the next day Dayna would take us to Cradle Mountain; the start of the Overland Track - can't get much better than that - but it did! Dayna is from Tasmania, but moved to Canada 2 years ago. She was in Tasmania the same time that we were because her sister was getting married. So in between helping her sister and helping to organize things as well as visit her family, Dayna still had time to spend with us to get us ready for our hike, and also to enjoy some sites. I also have to mention here that since our initial e-mail contacts, Dayna's Dad was admitted to the hospital to deal with an older injury. Not too serious, but enough to be a concern. So now, Dayna had the stress of helping her sister, knowing that her Dad was in the hospital and now us....... and she never let it show if she was stressed that's for sure. Her only request was that we visit her Dad in the hospital as he really wanted to meet us. This was more than okay, we wanted to meet her family and definitely go see her Dad. Dayna and her whole famiy were amazing! They treated us like family - we chatted & laughed and just had a good time. We missed Dayna's Dad; Chris, that night, but we would be back to visit Anne and Chris (Mom and Dad), Leah (sister) and Brendan (brother-in-law) after our hike - if they will have us! The night before we left to go to Cradle Mountain, Dayna's mom Anne cooked us one amazing meal - salmon, steak, veggies and wine and then proceeded to apologize for not serving us pasta to perpare us for our upcoming energetic track.......hmmmmmm.......7 days of freezed dried noodles of some sort with a pea or two in there - the meal served was a true treat indeed!!!

So the next day, it was off to Cradle Mountain. Even though Dayna was still tight for time - she had to be back for the wedding rehersal at 2pm, she still took the time to show us some sites - fresh Tasmanian made raspberry ice cream and cheeses.....mmmmmmm.......! Dayna dropped us off at the Visitor Centre for us to pick up our park passes successfully, but she was unfortunately late for the rehersal. To make us feel better, she said that the rehersal was really for Rocky; Leah and Brendan's dog. Rocky was taking the rings up the isle! As we know now, all went well, including Rocky's part!

Delia and I stayed in a cabin that is located at the start of the Overland Track. Very cute. It was rustic, but still had all the cooking facilities there for us to cook our food.....ahhhhh....the joys of freeze dried food! Delia looked for some walking sticks for the hike, we had dinner then it was off to bed. We had a great sleep and we were stoked to be starting the hike - Overland Track is considered one of the top 10 hikes in the world - I believe it!