September 3

Thursday 3 September

Nick’s 25th birthday today, so we gave him a call to wish him happy birthday this morning. It doesn’t seem 25 yrs since he was born though.

Today we decided to head off in the general direction of Port Arthur. There were a few places we wanted to see along the way and I have to say, they didn’t disappoint.

We stopped and admired the view at Eaglehawk Neck and from there went on to the Tasman Arch. It’s a very impressive bit of scenery. We also did bit of a walk around the two little lookouts they had, as well as a little further around to the Devil’s Kitchen.

Back in the car and down the road a little to the Tasman Blowhole. It seemed to be fairly quiet today but I imagine it could be quite impressive if the conditions were right.

The name of the little town where the Tasman Arch, Devil’s Kitchen and the Tasman Blowhole are is called Doo Town and many of the houses are named with the word Doo in them. Some of the names we saw were Doo Good, Doo Little, Rum Doo, Xanadu, Do Me Doo, Do F*&^ All, Dr Doolittle, It’ll Doo For Now, How Doo, Doo Write, To Doo, Doo Me, Much A Doo are the ones that we can think of off the top. There’s also a little road sign on the way into town that says Penguins Crossing.

From there it was down to Port Arthur. There was lots of roadkill on the road, mostly wombats and possums. There were plenty of signs for Tasmanian Devils too and a sanctuary for them that we drove past. The town of Port Arthur is a pretty little place and we decided to go to the historic site to take a few pics. I didn’t feel comfortable going in to wander around the site, so we just went into the gift shop for a browse before leaving again.

We stopped a bit up the road at a restaurant/café in Port Arthur and had the most delicious meal. Bob had some flounder with garlic mushrooms that was served on top of orange slices ~ yummy. I had a marinated chicken breast with rice and satay sauce that was served with salad as well. Very very nice. We also enjoyed a chai latte while we were there.

While we were having lunch, we found a brochure for a wooden boat builder in Franklin, so we decided to go take a peek. It was the opposite side of Hobart to where we were, but we figured we still had half the afternoon. We stopped along the way to get some more oysters and dropped them off at our apartment, as it was on the way and before we got back into Hobart.

Quick stop there and then back on the road through, towards Huonville and on to the little town of Franklin where we found the boat builders. It was sooo interesting. They are the only place in Australia that trains people in building wooden boats. It costs students $1200 a month and it takes them approximately 18 months to complete a Diploma in Wooden Boat Building. One of the students we saw was a girl, so good to see the girls interested in such a trade. We saw two boats in the process of construction and saw a couple that were finished ready for sale. There were also some out the back near the jetty that belong to other people. Gorgeous! And ever so tempting.

On the way back home, we stopped in Huonville and picked up some meat at a local butcher, He was quite a character and was telling us that the walk to Wineglass Bay was hard work, especially the return and that his wife fainted the last time they went.

Back home again to enjoy our oysters that I made Kilpatrick. Absolutely delicious. Oh my gosh, they are so so good.