From Sydney I hopped on the train for a short ride to the airport and then jumped on a plane headed for Australia’s southernmost state, Tasmania. I’ll be starting this part of my adventure in Tasmania’s capital, Hobart. Hobart seems like a fairly quiet seaside town. If you like to eat seafood (yes I most certainly do) then this is the place. Yummmm! After getting a new rental car and checking in at the hostel I had just enough time to hit the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, which also happens to be right across the street.

Right at the entrance was a big Muttaburrasaurus. I feel like he’s an old friend at this point. They had a really good art collection and a whole section about Australia’s role in Antarctic exploration. Tasmania is pretty darn close to Antarctica after all. Probably the most interesting thing I learned about though, was the Thylacine, or Tasmanian Tiger.

The thylacine became extinct in mainland Australia over 3000 years ago and only existed in one place on earth after that, Tasmania. It looks like a cross between a dog and a tiger, but it’s actually a marsupial. When Europeans arrived, these poor guys were thought of as a major threat to livestock and were hunted relentlessly. As a result they are unfortunately, now extinct everywhere on earth. The last one died at Hobart zoo in 1936. That’s her hide seen below. An incredibly sad story of a fascinating animal.

On a slightly happier note, they had this giant sperm whale skull. The whale died of natural causes and washed up on shore.

There’s not much else to do in Hobart, so now it’s time to start exploring this little island state. I started with Mt Field National Park a bit north. There’s a really great waterfall hike I want to do there. Hopefully you’re not sick of waterfalls yet. Aside from the falls, though, the forest alone was worth the trip. They’re simply called the Tall Trees. The whole hike I was surrounded by some of the tallest and most beautiful eucalyptus trees you can imagine.

The first waterfall on the hike was Russell Falls. It’s a somewhat famous waterfall in Tasmania, though I’m not sure exactly why. There are probably a few hundred waterfalls on this island. Anyway, I gave it a four on the gusher scale.

Not too far from that was a different looking waterfall with a ridiculously common name, Horseshoe Falls. It’s probably the second most common name for waterfalls in the world. Good thing it was pretty. A six on the gusher scale.

Much further out through the Tall Trees was the least visited Lady Barron Falls. I enjoyed this six gusher by myself for quite a while before heading back through those magnificent trees.

The next morning I drove to Kettering where I then took the Bruny Island Car Ferry over to the very oddly shaped Bruny Island just south of Hobart. It’s one island, but there’s a North Bruny and a South Bruny connected by a super narrow strip of land called The Neck. In the middle of the neck is the Truganini Lookout where you can get a great view of the whole thing. Supposedly at dusk you can come see penguins returning from their hard days work at sea.

My ultimate destination though was the Fluted Cape on South Bruny. I parked at the trailhead on Adventure Bay and started climbing up through another really beautiful forest.

After a long hike up I suddenly came to the very top and the very edge of one of the tallest sea cliffs in the southern hemisphere, the Fluted Cape. It was a looong way down!

After enjoying the view of the Southern Ocean from the top of Fluted Cape I made a hard left and the trail followed the cliff edge very very closely all the way down. I stopped frequently for pictures and most of those ledges were sphincter factor tens, very scary!

As I got closer to the bottom I had some absolutely fantastic views of Penguin Island, that little one just off shore. And looking back I got some equally fantastic views of Fluted Cape.

Bruny Island is well known for having lots of albino wallabies. I didn’t see any of the albino versions today, but on the hike down I was surprised by this regular one. Meet the Red Necked Wallaby, also known as a Bennett’s Wallaby.

Finally down at the waters edge I took a break to see Penguin Island up close.

Another hard left and through the beautiful coastal forest back to Adventure Bay. I think I’m going to rename this place Holy Crap Adventure Bay. They won’t mind.

Driving back north I had to stop at Two Tree Point. It’s literally a point with two trees. Ha! Captain James Cook himself stopped here for fresh water and to look around in the 18th century. In fact, this place was well known to lots sailors back then and the location is depicted in several 18th century paintings with these same two trees. That means these two are at least 250-300 years old. Wow!

On my visit to Two Tree Point I was blessed with a double rainbow. Didn’t see that in any of the paintings. On the far left between the two rainbows is Penguin Island for reference.

To get back to Hobart I have to take the car ferry again, but this time there was a pretty long line of cars. The ferry can only take so many cars at a time so I ended up waiting two hours! By the time I was on my way it was already dark. While I was waiting though, I spotted a bandicoot. They’re very very nocturnal. I think that’s a sign that I’ve been waiting for this stupid ferry for way too long.

The other big hike I planned on doing was to the Hartz Mountain summit. The weather was pretty nice when I left Hobart, but at Hartz Mountain it was very foggy, very windy, and very wet. It was so windy that I was half expecting a tornado to touch down at any minute. This is gonna be interesting. I almost got blown off those boardwalks a couple of times. Even though the weather sucked, this place was really beautiful. It looked like something out of a fantasy.

The trail passes a couple of lakes on the way. The first one was Lake Esperance, or at least what I could see of it. Visibility was very low and the gusts of wind almost blew me over into the water a couple of times. It was here that I decided I probably wasn’t going to make it all the way to the summit. Hiking in the clouds sounds awesome, but it’s really not that much fun.

Next, I made it to Ladies Tarn, the last lake before you have to start rock scrambling to the top. No visibility, super high winds, and heavy mist blowing in my face the whole time, no thanks. At least I can see all of this lake. Oh, and a small mountain lake is known as a tarn. I had to look that one up. They decided to get fancy naming this one for some reason. I’m learning all kinds of things on this trip.

Back at the trailhead was another hike to another beautiful lake, Lake Osborne, so I figured why not? In this ridiculous wind, this tiny serene mountain lake now has waves you could surf on. Cowabunga, dude!

I felt like I could brave the horrible weather for one more short hike, after all, I drove all this way and I’m already wet anyway. So, I ventured off to see Arve Falls. I ended up giving this an eight on the internationally recognized gusher scale.

They built the lookout point kind of in the middle of the falls. The pic below is only about half of it. The rest of the water was flowing over the cliff and out of view below my feet. I’m still glad I came up here even if I didn’t summit Mt Hartz. This place is really gorgeous!

Hobart is overlooked by the towering Mt Wellington. On my way back to town I thought I would drive to the top and enjoy the view from up there. Unfortunately, the road was closed a little over half way there for construction. Rats! You can still hike about four and a half miles round trip from the closure, but it was already 4:30pm. Too late to start that one. Instead, I had to settle for the view from the Springs Lookout. I’m pretty sure that’s North Bruny way out there.

Almost down the mountain and back to town I got a sort of consolation view in this residential area. That’s Hobart, or at least part of it. Downtown is easy to make out, where I’m staying and eating my weight in fish every night.

On my way out of Hobart to the next stop I paid a visit to the Bonorong Wildlife Sanctuary. They rescue wayward and injured animals, provide homes for the ones that can’t be released back into the wild, and participate in lots of conservation and reintroduction programs. I thought it would be a good way to see some Australian natives that I’m highly unlikely to see in the wild. One of the two critters that I’ve been most excited to see was the Tasmanian devil.

This little devil was only out for a minute and then he ran back into one of the burrows to go back to sleep, but I managed to get a couple of pics before he did. The second critter that I was most hoping to see was a wombat, seen below. Apparently, a lot of the animals that get hit by cars die with a baby in their pouch. So it’s common practice to check the pouch when you come across a fresh road kill just in case. That’s unfortunately what happened to this cutie, and a lot of the animals here actually. I’m not sure if they’re planning to release her eventually or keep her here, but either way she’s still too young and small yet.

It was super ultra windy and cold this day too, so a lot of the marsupials were hiding and taking shelter. Not exactly the best day to visit. They also have a bunch of tiger snakes, the most venomous snake in the world, but they must have been hiding too. I was hoping to see them here because I absolutely don’t want to run into one of those in the wild, but oh well. The birds however, were out and about as usual.

They must have a lot of Tasmanian devils because there were several different enclosures for them. The only other one I saw, though, was this guy napping in one of the burrows. Super zoom lens saves the day again!

I wasn’t having a ton of luck with the non bird species, but somehow I just knew the echidna wouldn’t let me down. Sure enough, as soon as I walked up, he came out of the bushes to say hi. I definitely have some weird karmic connection with these guys.

When I first got here and paid for my ticket, they gave me a bag of kangaroo food. They said they have a bunch of free roaming kangaroos and feel free to feed and pet them all you like. Awesome! Iwant seeing any kangaroos though, and all day I kept thinking, “Where are all the kangaroos?” It wasn’t until I got to the back corner of the sanctuary that I spotted them at the far end of a big enclosure where you’re not allowed to go. Stupid wind!

Just after that I did find one kangaroo all by herself far from the others. I’m not sure why she wasn’t with the rest of them, but I was very happy to see her. She wasn’t interested in the food at all. She was all about getting those scritches though. For some reason I expected her fur to be really coarse, but it was surprisingly soft.

Before heading out I wandered back to see if the energetic wombat was still out. I’m guessing it’s because she’s so young that she’s so active. I wish I could bring her back home with me.

Finally, we have Fred. Fred is a sulphur crested cockatoo that was a well cared for pet. Unfortunately, he just outlived his owner. Fred is 111 years old and is believed to be the second oldest living bird in the world. Wow! There’s been no news of the oldest living bird in the world since 2014 though, so Fred may very well be in the top spot now. The all time record holder died in 1916 at 120 years old. Fred looks at you like he knows things that your puny brain will never be able to comprehend. Respect!

Well, despite being denied a couple of summits and dealing with this ridiculous annoying wind, this has been a pretty fun stop on my down under adventure. This also marks the half way point of the trip. Six weeks in and six more to go, so don’t wander too far, there’s still more to come…