Southern Tour Day 2: Hobart touring

By the numbers

10.44 kms

13,933 steps

1 boat

1 museum

 

I got up early enough so that I could go shop hunting through Hobart that was nearby to where I am staying. I wanted to know what bakeries were in the area so that I could get coffee and maybe a pie before wandering off onto my tours especially when I am on the run and going on early tours. I stopped at Maccas first as I wanted to have a full belly before taking a wander.

 

The tour I was taking today was the Iron pot tour run by one of the local tour companies that takes you out to the oldest lighthouse in Australia known as the Iron pot. I had to check in with them and I confirmed my Port Arthur tour for the next day as I would be up pretty early to be there. The boat tour would take us right out of the Derwent River, which is the Hobart river going through the city. Before we left the city I had asked if two ships that were nearby were icebreakers aka research ships for Antarctica. They were indeed those sorts of ships. There was the Australian one that is relatively new called Nuyina. There was also a French one too. Basically I was lucky to see both and I was happy for that. We were taken past Battery Point a historic area of Hobart with plenty of older buildings and even past the point where the Sydney to Hobart boats cross the finish line, but we were doing it backwards. There were stories of the boats making it into the river only to take hours to get over the line as there was no wind, so the boat that would win wasn’t the one that was taking line honours or something like that. I would get to see some of Bruny island out near Storm Bay. Storm Bay was meant to be rough and today was basically an exception as it was pretty calm while we were on the water. I was happy to be taken to different parts of the bay with other people. I did get to see the salmon farms where Houn had their fish. We did see some dolphins that were around and did follow them. The other sealife were seals lounging on the rocks, sea eagles, seaguills and the Mutton bird otherwise known as the short tailed shearwater. It did rain a little while we were out on the water, but it was well worth going out and we were late in returning, which was lucky as I had not made any plans.

 

Once we were docked and back on dry land, I headed off to get something to eat and found the bakery I had found earlier. After a pie that sent me back towards the hostel as I wanted to visit the Tasmanian museum. That is luckily free to visit and I had to hand over my bag. My phone was getting low on charge, but that wasn’t a huge deal as I had my powerbank with me and it was on charge while I wandered around. There was only one dinosaur and that was sitting out the front entrance to the museum. There were parts that did hold my interest like the room that housed information about the Tasmanian Tiger, also known as the Thylacine. I was interested in watching video of footage that I had never seen before and all that would run in my mind was ‘bastards’. Basically they were killed because they wandered near farms where a shoot first policy occurred and maybe ask later. There was a little bit of information, but not much. Maybe I could get a book on the subject later. I did learn that Jack Jumper ants were not good for your health and you could end up getting pretty sick from their bite that includes being fatal. There was plenty of information about Antarctica and some of the expeditions that included some of the gear they used and the various islands that tend to be disputed between mainly the British and Argentina. Macquarie Island that is in Australia territory and has research stations in various areas that includes one place where the water table is just below the surface, so you could get wet. There is another island that has an active volcano called Big Ben that is the only active volcano Australia has.

 

Once I was finished at the museum as it was close to closing time, I was wondering where I could go next and though I could head up to Battery Point, which is a historic area of Hobart of old buildings from the convict era. It was like I was in Wellington as I had to walk up hill and I didn’t take the steps known as Kellys stairs as I was a touch far away from Salamanca, although I was skirting the edges by going up the hill. The streets were narrow and hilly too, and I found a historic bakery though I did walk on and there was a nearby circus, but not the animal kind. This place is called Arthur Circus, which was basically a roundabout with a park in the middle and nothing bigger than cars could go around anyway. I was heading towards Princes Park as there was an old historic building that was called the Signalman’s house and it was used to transmit messages through flag signals and to identify ships. I was starting to get hungry and it was trying to rain again. At the bottom of the park there was the research buildings for the CSIRO, which I would guess would be due to how close the icebreakers were in the town. Once I had some food at the Brick Factory as it was my second time there. It was close and I didn’t mind the place at all.