Australian Adventure: Tasmania

How can I even begin to describe Tasmania?

It's like The World of Warcraft in real life.

It had the sprawling, lush, orderly farmland

(Fruit, Hay, Wool, Lumber industries seemed particularly plentiful)

It has the dense forest and sweeping vistas and cliffs.

The exotic creatures that spawn out of NOWHERE

(and wander right in the middle of the road because they're fearless and none too bright)

It has the big city that everyone but you knows their way around.

A Haunted castle-prison

And EVERYTHING IS CLOSE to EVERYTHING else.

I think its really cool that such a small place can have so much diversity and not feel crowded.

On the first day, Red rented a white car and drove us to Port Arthur. Because she's still not accustomed to driving in australian roads, I came up with a little saying to help her remember what side of the road to stay on

"Left is Theft"

Whenever we entered the road, came to an intersection, made a turn, or got into one of those extremely annoying round-abouts we would use that phrase to remind us to drive on the left side of the road in australia (originally a prison colony, so thieves were sent there).

It was really, really corny (and funny) but we didn't crash the car so I guess it worked!

We listened to epic music on the radio and drove to Port Arthur (The Haunted Castle-Prison) and spent the day touring there.

The prison was established for secondary offenders with the aim of rehabilitation. It was constructed using the principles developed by Jeremy Bentham. I suppose that (for its day) it was a comparatively humaine place to be incarcerated, but by today's standards it is pretty creepy.

Esspecially how the class system was segrigated and the "Separate Prison".

As with the ruins at Cockatoo island in Sydney, we could explore the whole place pretty freely. There was a walking tour, a ferry tour and there was even a ghost tour (We came back for that one at night. I didn't see experience a haunting, but there were some really cool stories of people who lived at Port Arthur...as well as of a prevous 'ghost tour' group who, while visiting the medical examiner's autopsy room/basement, were attacked by a mouse!)

It was cool they had a family history catalogue room there, and they encouraged people who have "convict ancestry" to use it.

They use the phrase "convict ancestry"the same way my family would say "pioneer ancestry" which I thought was weird at first. But I came to learn most of the "convicts" at Port Arthur were not hardened criminals, they were poverty-stricken and the British government didn't know what to do with them. Reading the convicts history, most of them were improvershed, petty criminals, or mentally ill. Serously, if someone in an australian prison-colony stole something or didn't show up for work one day, they were were sent to Port Arthur (the murderers and extremely violent criminals were exicuted).

Australia must be big on performing arts as an educational venue, because they had actors who did skits around the park. They would reinact scenes from the lives of some of the convicts who lived there.

One of the actors dialogue went something like this:

"They sent us here to get rid of us. They don't care about us. If they could have killed all of us with a clean conscious they would have done it."

That is...extremely depressing. And its probably why the "rehabilitation" efforts that took place there were largely not effective.

We also got to hike on two separate trails: one along the shoreline and one into the forest and saw some the wildlife there. But we saw the most animals after dark.

I swear, all the little critters must have signed a suicide-pact because so many of them just stand in the middle of the road after dark.

There isn't even any food there!

The next day we drove around the pennisula: There was so much to see, I think we could have spent the entire time there and not beheld all of it. There were coal mines, and huge cliffs that look like pipe organs, white beaches, and lots and lots of wildlife.

Afterward we drove north (almost to the other side of the state) to a town called Perth. I wished we could have gone all the way to the northern shore, but unfortunately we had to get back to our campsite on the south-ish side of the state.

That night was the first night I'd been able to see the stars, so Red and I went on a "nature walk" and looked for the southern cross.

(I think I should add a little note here: Red wears extremely stylish and attractive glasses whereas I am not able to wear them. As children we would spend long hours outside after dark but it wasn't until she started wearing glasses that she realized the craters on the moon make the shape of a man's face.

Red was convinced I wouldn't be impressed the constillation them because she said (somewhat dismississively: 'Its supposed to be a cross but its just those two stars, over there.'

What I saw was five stars arrainged roughly into the shape of an upside down kite, as if it had gotten stuck in a tree.

When I told her this, Red responded:

"What?!? Whatever, lets go!"

And we went to look at sheep.

The next day we went to church. I really liked the speakers. All of them were older women and they talked about stuff like the love of God, the sabbath, and the atonement. It was gospel that came out of scripture and the heart, not dictated word-for-word by a general conference talk or out of a manual. I think more church's need to have sermons like that.

Later we went driving and to an animal reserve (Kinda like a vet and a zoo put into one)

It was really awesome and I got to pet a koala, a baby wombat, and feed a kangaroo (they didn't let us pet the tasmanian devils, but...you know...you can't have everything!)

When I was a little kid, I went to the San Diego Wild Animal Park with my G.P and that is where I made one of the most importiant decisions in my life:

I thought, "It would be really cool to be a zookeeper and take care of animals."

Then I thought "No, I should be a nurse and take care of babies...and my husband will be a zookeeper. AND HE CAN TAKE ME TO SEE THE ANIMALS!!!"

Those ambitions have remained fairly constent, even though I haven't been fortunate enough to work as a maternal-child care nurse (or marry a zookeeper).

I confided these childhood aspirations to my sister right before we went into the reserve. And there was this...guy...

(And shall we say...he was...a keeper)

Red didn't give me a super-difficult time about it, she actually interacted with him a lot more then I did, but it was funny.

Later we went for another long drive. I think we would have made it to the Creepy Crawlly Walk, except for the gas stations were close and we didn't want to get stranded.

We saw a stupid crow-thing standing right in the middle of the road, on our way out of.town  We didn't hit it but on the way back, we noticed a roadkill that looked suspicously like it. (Seriously? What is the matter with these animals?)

The next day went to the airport, returned the car, and headed back to Sydney.

DON'T READ THIS NEXT PART ITS DUMB

I like to imagine a little possum family living on the land mass that became Tasmania several hundered thousand years ago.  The family grows so they must separate. Eventually forming separate (but related) tribes. (The Tazmanian Tiger, the Tasmanian devil, the opssiom, the kangaroo, and the wombat)

So after thousands upon thousands of years they have a family reunion. To commemorate the loss of their friend The Tasmanian Tiger.

But now they've changed so much they don't recognize each other!

The Smallish-Red-Kangaroo says: "Dude, what happened to you?"

And the Rat-kangaroo/wombat thingy goes:
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN WHAT HAPPENED TO ME, WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU!?!?!"

And the opossum is all, like: "Hey, yall! What up?! You've changed!"

As the three argue about who has changed the most they don't notice they are standing in the middle of the road and get.hit by a car.

A smallish Bear-Bager arrives and goes: "Ugh! I'm always late for these things."
Another car comes.