burs

After visiting Christchurch, I took a 3 day week, while taking the Friday off to go to the Melbourne Beer Spectapular.. part of Melbourne beer week.  If I remember right, it was ~60 beers on tap, but if you are feeling spunky and want to call me out on that number, you can count the taps in the picture.  There were some interesting brews.  One beer was flavored with rose pedals... another with chili peppers, and one tasted like the warhead candies.  While, interesting, I have to say that my favorites were some of the classic styles.  My absolute favorite was a Simcoe Imperial IPA by Liberty Brewing in NZ.  Each brewery was supposed to submit an original beer that they don't sell commercially... at least not as of the event.  Anyhow, whenever you're looking around and think hmmm this may taste good in a beer... I say try it.. but be warned that you may not get many takers on that style.  Barley and hops remain the #1 ingredients ni my book... with maybe a touch of wheat. 

Seeing Red

On my way out of Christchurch, I saw the entire Queensland Reds team going through the International terminal.  They were the team that played the Crusaders on the previous day.  The unfortunate part of the airport was that I had to spend 10 hours there because they canceled my original flight.  Luckily, I can sleep in strange places... blogged with my family, did some shopping, had coffee, some more coffee, and coffee.  I also luckily brought some work to do.  All in all, the Christchurch airport was a pleasent place to be delayed.  

Crusading

Wow, so much has been going on.  I feel like I haven't had any time to update this blog.  I'll try to fastforward my devoted readers through the past couple of months.  I headed to Christchurch in May, which was the first time in a long time.  Ironically, one of my friends from there was training in Melbourne to be a flight attendent for Jetstar, and we somehow ended up on the same flight. 

The downside to that was that the 3 hour flight left at midnight and arrived at 5am.  The trip was a bit of a whirlwind.  I headed to the mountains during my first day... of course.  I hiked up Avalanche Peak with a friend.  It was an amazing day for the mountains (then again, all days are great for that).  Then we raced back to meet old friends for a brew. I forgot how much I enjoyed New Zealand beer. 

However, I started to notice that my beer is actually starting to taste better than some of my favorites, which I attribute to the fact that I brewed it and also that it's a little fresher.  Freshness makes a big difference.   On the next day, I headed to a rugby game to watch my favorite team, The Crusaders.  Oddly enough, I followed that up later that week with another Crusaders game in Melbourne.  I have to say that the beer they served in Christchurch for the game was great and better than what I got in Melbourne. 

The Tasmania Conclusion

 After Port Arthur, it was time to get back into the wilderness and some National Parks.  I headed north toward the Maria Island port.  The entire island is a National Park and there is camping!  There are also sea cliffs, so it seemed quite appealing.  So, I drove into Triabunna around 4 something... 15-30 minutes after the last ferry for the day.  The next day was almost booked up and the the return ferry would have pushed me past my flight.   

I suppose these are the vacation problems when one flys by the seat of one's pants.  Luckily,there are multiple great National Parks in Tasmania.  I headed to Freycinet National Park, which was absolutely beautiful.  I arrived there just after dark and setup camp.  Some possums tried to come eat my noodles, but I wouldn't have it and decided to take them down to the rocky beach.  It was a beautiful night.  I climbed a mountain the next day... because that's what I do.  It was very beautiful.  The climb started out like Stone Mtn in Atlanta, but got much steeper near the end.  It certainly would be impossible in the rain.  The view on top was well worth it.  I ate some snickers, figured out how to work my phone camera, and then headed back to Hobart to catch my flight back to Melbourne. 

Snails in my Mail... Curses

I don't know how common this is in Melbourne, but almost every time we get a fair amount if rain, I get snails in my mailbox. I've found up to two at a given time.  The odd thing is that there are no holes large enough for the shells to get in. Plus my box is always locked.  I think it's a mailman conspiracy. Do they mature after already being in the box? The funny thing is that the snails will eat my mail. It would be great for children with bad mailed report cards... Not so great when bills are unreadable.

Where's the coffee?

To continue describing my Tasmania Easter trip: 

Something I really enjoyed, despite its simplicity is what they call Tesselated Pavement.  It looks like a brick wall on the ground.  It is formed from the shifts in the earth that occur in three directions (2 obvious perpindicular ones in the image).  As the water erodes these "fault lines", little rounded bricks begin to form.  

I set off to find coffee.  It looked like the biggest nearby town was Port Arthur.  As I drove, I noticed a tourist "i" sign and pulled on in.  These places always are a sign for coffee.  This place had tons of tourists pouring in.  I grabbed some pamphlets as I went to drink my coffee... which was absolutely delicious.  Apparently this place was a penal colony and is now a historic site, where they hold ghost tours and what not.  Due to the dreary day, I thought... perfect. 

So, I headed on in.  They asked if I wanted a ferry to the Isle of the Dead.  I said, "heck yes."  Any isle with that name is an isle for me.  It reminds me of a song I heard while writing my dissertation on Halloween 2010... called the Isle of the Dead by Rachmaninoff, which also corresponds with a painting that I really like by Böcklin.  The island had over 1200 people buried in it.  The island is tiny.  It was freezing and cloudy out, which went well with the otherwise sunshine and rainbows atmosphere.   

Bad David Kill Camera

I made my way over to the east coast to the Tasman Peninsula.  It was a big National Park with sea cliffs, so I thought it would be a good a stop.  What I didn't realize is that very little of it is actually accessible by car.  I got there just in time to catch the sunset, which was magnificent, as it usually is in beautiful locations of nature.  As a complete aside, all info areas around here were actually just peoples' houses.  It was very confusing when I followed the information signs (the blue signs with the i).      

Anyhow, I managed to stop at all 3 point of interest sites in the NP within 30 minutes.  Unfortunately, a very sad and stupid incident occured at my last stop for the night.  I thought I would get a self-portrait... because mum likes those.  Being the shy guy that I am, I didn't ask anyone to take the picture.  So, I setup my camera on a railing, which had a nice flat place for cameras.  The bad part is that the wind was blowing pretty well.  I thought... hmmm.. my camera could blow off.  Bah, let's do it anyhow.  Well.... please refer to photo.  I think it can be fixed by the manufacturer, but I still feel silly, when I had a inkling for what would happen. 

Then, it was time to find a place to sleep.  I thought about finding a hotel... but eh.  I love the outdoors... and admittingly, I'm a cheap man.  I am what I am.  So, I found a remote location in the park that had nearby tourist attractions.  I stopped the car and took a look around to see if I should setup camp.  To sum up what this area was, was that it was a parking lot, with some sand and a short footpath that leads to another tourist attraction site.  The point it is that it wasn't really a proper place to camp.  Finally, I gave up on that spot as tourists began walking around.  I didn't want to seem like too much of a bum.  So, I drove into the most remote dirt roads of the park and found a nice spot next to a dumped refrigerator and furniture.  It actually was a fairly nice spot... other than the trash.