There and back

I'm back in Melbourne. It's 10am on Christmas Day [good tidings to those of you who give a toss ;-)] and I have absolutely nothing better to do than this. What a life. As it happens, I'm being extremely sad and catching up on my washing at the same time - the hotel laundry being located slap bang next to the Internet PC's. Hoopy's still asleep after rolling in from the Casino (drinking, not gambling, I hasten to add) around 03:00. I couldn't hack the pace and was back in bed by 01:00 - mind you, I had been up since 06:30. I suppose I could always do what an old friend of Ali's did once and blame the Jet Lag - on a one hour flight in the same time zone. Mmmm.

Tasmania was just fantastic. My favourite place so far by a long way. After leaving Scottsdale on Thursday, I headed over to the North East coast and hung around St Helens for a few hours, popping back inland to Pyengana in the evening where I spent the night (and shared several gallons of ale with locals & visitors alike) at the internationally known Pub In The Paddock. What a great place! Beer drinking pigs and everything - and no, that's not a colloquial description of the resident Australian males.

That's the bar above. I've finally got somewhere where I can upload pictures from, though rather than include too many in these postings I'll probably whack 'em up somewhere else and link to them. Anne, Peter and Irene were exceptional hosts and I even got the chance to play good Samaritan, as four cyclists turned up - one with a broken bike - who ended up staying the night so I could give the guy a ride into town the following morning.

Friday I went back over to the NE coast for a few hours, then headed south (passing some very badly fire damaged forests and massive walnut plantations along the way) to overnight at the Island View motel in Orford. And what a view! Maria Island directly in front with a cracking view across Prosser Bay right from my room. Quite possibly one of the best views you'd ever get from a bedroom window (looking outwards, at least!). Spent an hour or so wandering around Triabunna as well - a neat little town that seems to have pretty much everything you'd need.

Saturday I headed off down to Franklin to meet up with John, Marguerite and Thomas Sturm. Stopping en-route to purchase beverages and flowers, I had a good laugh upon discovering that Huonville's florist shop also doubled up as the store where one could purchase toys for adult entertainment. Quite bizarre.

We had a fun day, centered around food, drink and good conversation. A nice way to finish my time in Tasmania, which was definately too short. I want to go back now!

By contrast, from what I've seen of Melbourne so far, you can keep it. It's grey, dirty and much like any sprawling city anywhere in the world. There are redeeming factors - some of the architecture is most impressive and the South Bank has some nice bars and restaurants, but "downtown" is, er, horrible. Of course, that's purely my opinion so far (Hoopy's too as it happens) and your mileage may vary. To be honest, once tomorrow's out of the way (Boxing Day at the MCG, should be the best atmosphere we'll ever experience at a cricket match), I'd be happy to do something else, somewhere else, before we head to Sydney on Friday.

Whilst I was having all that fun in Tasmania, back in Melbourne poor Hoopy wasn't feeling too good and spent most of Friday in bed. He did manage to get out and about most of the time though, getting a book signed by Shane Warne at a local store on Thursday, visiting the museum yesterday and discovering that unlike everywhere else we've been to in Australia so far, Victoria still allows smoking indoors. Yep, we both are again. Sometimes. However, unlike everywhere else in Australia, Victoria does not seem to allow the publication of advertisments for licenced brothels in it's newspapers, which has rather taken the fun out of that particular daily ritual.

Now it's time for me to go hang up the washing that can't go in the dryer. Boy I know how to live.