Australia (1/4): Tasmania
Our good friend Jonas from Sweden joined us in Australia for four weeks of holidays. After meeting him in Melbourne we wanted to have a look at Tasmania (Tassie, as the locals call it), as we had heard that the nature is really nice there. We took a plane, as it is surprisingly a lot cheaper and faster than to go by ferry. We decided to stay in Tasmania only for four days, as we had five weeks in total in Australia, and in that time one can see only tiny part of this huge country.
In Tasmania we first celebrated the birthday of Jonas in the capital Hobart, traditionally in an Irish pub.
Next day we headed to Bruny Island down from Hobart. First evening there we saw our first wallabies, brown and white ones. It was really cool, there was tens of them and they came to the camping area just few meters from us. Well, we first thought the brown ones were kangaroos, as these animals look very much alike, but later heard from locals what they were. The very same evening, we also got to see a few blue penguins. Once again, we couldn’t take pictures because of the dark.
Next day we went to an animal park to see the endangered Tasmanian devils. Those guys can be really vicious towards each other, but can also look cute (when they are sleeping). In the park we also saw kangaroos, koalas, wombats, echidnas. They are all sooooo cute! Even though Netta doesn’t normally love animals that much, the boys had to almost carry her out as she could have stayed there for ages.
There are many national parks in Tasmania. We had time to have a hike in three of them on the east coast, South Bruny-, Freycinet-, and Douglas-Apsley National Parks. The hikes were very nice and landscapes special. On the last hike half of the path was along an almost dried, rocky river and we got to jump from rock to rock, that was fun. Landscape along the road was also quite interesting, with cliffs, blow holes, rocky arches, sand and rock beaches …