Tasmania

Freya and I have just got back from a week in Tasmania and it was so good! We originally planned to go to see our housemate Pancks who lives in Hobart and spend Easter with her fam - I am so glad we went because boy is tas a stunner!

 

So on Sat we flew to Hobart where Pancks' dad picked us up from the airport, he then gave us a driving tour around hobart before she actually arrived home (she had a later flight) and he is just such a babe! Her mum had stocked up on the chocolate for easter, and when I say stocked up I mean I physically couldn't eat any more chocolate which is pretty big news for me. We were completely spoilt by her fam, they took us out to lunch and on little tours around Hobart - we went to this really nice apple farm where they brew cider and we had a taster pallet (cherry one was lush) and we went on dog walks and went to the top of this mountain overlooking Hobart where it was freezing and really reminded me of home.

We also took a cheeky trip to MONA - the museum of old and new art which is apparently really famous. It is completely funded by a professional gambler and has the most amazing exhibits although the one I really wanted to go to was closed for refurbishment :( That was the poo factory, where they have 4 chambers and feed one chamber and then a few hours later it has digested the food and it poops it out (heartbroken). They also had the vagina wall which was fun and they drop the C bomb a lot in the descriptions- maybe thats an arty thing to do. You could even by C*** soap from the shop which were little soaps of plaster cast vages. Weird.

Back at Pancks' house we played monopoly with chocolate on the properties that you could bargain with (great addition to the game) and my competitive side really came out - I don't think Freya had seen it before and it shocked her a little when I did my evil cackle when she was losing. Got to work on that. We also played frustration and cluedo and I didn't win anything and was feeling rather hopeless so we moved on to a jigsaw.

After we left Hobart on the tuesday we rented a car and drove up to Coles bay. I hadn't got a clue how beautiful Tasmania was, it is just jaw dropping. A few minutes out of the city and the road goes past long stretches of completely empty beaches, white sand and bright blue water - bloody amazing!

So when we got to coles bay we decided to do the walk up to the lookout point over wineglass bay. It was only an hour and a half return trip but we hadn't really thought it through and realised with dismay that we would have to be walking up a hill. Needless to say, we made it, and the views were lush. Embarassingly we got to the first lookout point, thought it was wineglass bay, slated them for having a rubbish name because it looked nothing like a wineglass and wasn't all that great, sat on a rock taking victorious 'top of the hill' pictures for 15 mins, then realised we were only half way and had to keep going... 

Victorious photo

I made freya pose with a bottle of water because I thought it made it look like we had climbed a massive hill and were really tired and sporty, I reckon it pulls off that effect perfectly.

The actual wineglass bay... 

Just up from coles bay was honeymoon bay, where we, along with various other romantic couplings, watched the sunset. It was really really beautiful, the rocks we were sitting on went all orangey red and it was just gorgeous. 

That night we stayed in a little hostel in Bicheno, it was all wooden like a chalet and the temperature dropped so much overnight it really felt like a winter holiday! On wednesday we drove up to the bay of fires. Honestly, I have never seen such amazing beaches! We stopped off in the morning to one on the way and were like 'well this is just about my favourite beach in the world' and then mere hours later we found another one even better! Binalong Bay had the whitest sand I have ever seen, it looked like snow so I proceeded to make a snow/sand angel..

After binalong was the bay of fires, a long stretch of beaches and bays off one long road. All the beaches were completely deserted despite being Easter holidays so we frollicked until our hearts were content. 

This was where we found our absolute favourite beach, and decided to come back the next morning with flasks of hot chocolate, hats, blankets and jumpers. It was so lovely, completely empty bar Freya and I, in the middle of nowhere- it was so quiet. Just a perfect spot!

That night we stayed in St Helens, and the next morning took our final trip inland towards Launceston. It was all rolling green hills, forests, windy little roads, cows etc. reminded me a little bit of english countryside! First stop was a cheese factory (hold up, it was not for me alas but Freya, I have not changed my anti-cheese ways as of yet) where we had delish burgers (courtesy of the farm's cows) in the sunshine with a yummy cider coincidently from the apple farm we visited in hobart!

Further along our route we had to go through this windy road through the bush and there WAS A BUSH FIRE! You can kind of see the smoke in the picture above, it looks like dark cloud but it was quite scary. The smoke was clouding over the sun and made this amazing orangey light, it felt like the sun was setting but it was only 2 in the afternoon. I've read so much about bush fires I was cacking my pants because it definitely felt like we were moving closer to it but we were fine! When we were further up we could see it down in the valley and it wasn't too big (phew). The best bit of the day was just driving through the countryside - Freya let me be DJ! (which was brave of her as I am well known for my crap music taste, but she said I did alright! Wahoo!!).  Next stop was the lavender farm, I had seen pictures on pinterest of it and it looked amazing so we went 20km off our road to go, only to find that they had recently harvested it so there were just little stumps of lavendar and loads of wasps (I wasnt happy at all, Freya even got stung). Not our finest moment!

Got roped in with this one...

Bloody normal field isn't it

Finally, we headed into Launceston for our last night and flew home the next afternoon! Short but very sweet, and one of the most gorgeous places I have ever been.