August 31

Monday 31 August

We decided to go for a walk on the beach this morning, but we’d only just got there when it started to sprinkle. We could see storm clouds coming but thought we’d take our chances anyway. In the few minutes we were there, we saw two planes coming in so tomorrow morning, we’re going to head up to the beach and sit under the flight path. The planes come in quite low as the runway is just past the sand dunes.

Came back to our apartment, had some breakfast and a shower before heading off for Mt Wellington. We could see snow on the top of the mountain and were hopeful of seeing some more. Unfortunately the road was closed further up due to snow and they were soon going to be closing the rest of the road. We did manage to get some pics though.

We decided to go back down the mountain towards a place called Huonville where there are lots of wineries and orchards. We hadn’t got too far when we came across some cars blocking the road. Initially we thought there had been a road accident, but nope, just a tree fallen across the road. We waited for it to be cleared and were then on our way again.

We stopped briefly at Huonville and decided to keep going towards a little place called Cygnet. Lots of daffodils in flower and a quaint little town right on the water. From Cygnet we headed towards Woodbridge and along the way found a place called Hartz View Vineyard. The woman working there was absolutely delightful and explained so much of the area’s history. There were some heritage listed fruit pickers’ huts at the vineyard which held an interesting history too. We tasted some delicious fortified fruit wines and finished with some apple mead. Of course, we walked out with a little stash. Not bad for non drinkers! We also came away with some of the most delicious dukkah I’ve ever tasted.

Back on the road again towards Woodbridge and Kettering where we found a fabulous butcher who we purchased some more oysters from and some crumbed lamb cutlets which I haven’t seen in years.

Kept driving and found ourselves in a little place called Margate where they have an old train that is made into various types of stores. We checked out the sweets store and had a scrumptious lunch in the pancake carriage.

From there it was back to Hobart, a quick stop in a shopping centre where I found an awesome purple felt hat on sale and we picked up a couple of dvd’s to enjoy while the weather was miserable, then back home to our apartment. The weather has been quite cool all day, lots of rain, some snow, plenty of wind and generally very very cold.