Day 101: Hobart

Tuesday 15th March

Accidentally deleted this

Mount Wellington

Salamanca

Bridge

Botanic Gardens

Harbour- fishing boats and jam factory

Cascade Brewery

Distance:

Total Distance:

I accidentally deleted this whilst tired and trying to upload over 2 weeks of posts.

What I deleted was the best blog article you could ever have read. These is a poor attempt at reproducing such work. Also I'm in New Mexico now so I'll probably just hammer through and get it done. Sorry Hobart.

The morning came with the rude awakening when someone had stollen both my breakfast and my leftovers from dinner. I've never knowingly had anything stollen at a hostel before or since. This was a shock to me. As did the middle aged man getting beers out of the fridge. I have to say this hostel was picked for me by the tour company I was with- the cheapest in Hobart. Tassie Backpackers. It was odd and awful. 

So breakfast was toast and vegemite, which isn't too bad a start at least.

Our tour was a selection of day trippers, people who had just finished the five day tour I was about to do around e rest of the island, and two of us just starting out. Our tour guide for the day looked like a thinner, younger, Peter Jackson.

The weather was coming in quickly that morning. We had been scheduled to go up to Mount Wellington later in the day but we wouldn't see anything with the clouds descending on the summit. So up there early for a cold walk around and stare down at Hobart.

It's Scotland! Or maybe the Yorkshire Dales! The summit was cold, windy, and wet, but I've dealt with that a million times. I went and explored the rocky summit and stared out at the moor land that stretches out to further mountains and hills. Back on the Hobart there's a glass building to protect tourists from nature as one looks down onto the city. I got some better views and pictures at the lower lookouts below the glass house. We could see out and down to the estuary and river that the city-port is built around. 

We went down to Salamanca to pick up lunch. The plan was to buy something to later eat in the Botanical Gardens so I went in search of the recommended bakery. Salamanca is now an upmarket selection of shops and restaurants. It was once the warehouses that serviced the port. They became derelict but were refurbished and are now the centre of late night eating for tourists and locals alike.

Before the gardens we made a quick stop on the other side of the estuary. From here we could see the main bridge that services Hobart. Many people live on the far side and work in the city. The airport is on this time too. 

It's not easy for captains of commercial shipping vessels to get between the columns supporting the bridge though. There was one major crash that occurred in the middle of the night. It was decided that the captain hadn't been going fast enough to work against the current and get past the bridge. He took out three columns before falling to the bottom, where the ship still lays. A gap opened on the bridge and, being dark, many people lost their lives driving into it in the first few minutes of the disaster. This gap wasn't closed for a long time. The work done on the bridge extended many commuters' travel time by hours going up river to the other bridge. 

Now a system is in place that the bridge is closed whenever ships are going beneath e bridge. This is great for stopping accidents of the same scale but can add a surprise 20 minutes to the transit time to and from the airport. You have been warned!

At the gardens I started on the large bags of very cheap tomato and onion rolls I'd bought at the bakery. I wouldn't eat them all, which meant that they could later replace my lost left overs and breakfast.

The Royal Botanic Garden of Hobart is small but lovely. They have a new Japanese garden which feels like a 1/4 scale picturesque, perfect, valley, complete with scale water mill.

A red brick wall dividends the garden and provides shelter from the troublesome Tasmanian climate. Hidden by it is the mixed temperate border featuring flowering plants from across the world as well as the rose beds.

Further over is the Victorian glasshouse. Unlike most though only the roof is glass. The walls are made of thick, insulating, sandstone. Inside the place is glamorous and sculpted with a central fountain and hangin baskets all around. It looks like a Graeco-Roman shrine!

Down at the harbour we were shown the variety of fishing boats used here commercially. Most go out at night or early morning so a good number were moored. 

There was one that goes after a Japanese delicacy- a shellfish people must dive to pull up. A special license is needed to do this dangerous job and there's only 1 running out of Hobart. The shellfish are worth huge amounts of money though, so it's a great business if you've got the million or so needed to start up.

A few were the usual fish or pots boats. Another that caught my eye though was the one with black painted throughout its deck. This is a squid catching boat. It goes out at night, puts lights over the edge, and squid swarm to the light. These can then be caught with a hook and brought on board. However, firstly they produce their ink, so the black deck doesn't get noticeably stained by the black ink. Secondly the black doesn't reflect the lights, so any squid on the deck doing try to scuttle off towards the lights.

Alongside this harbour are more old warehouses plus a jam factory. These have all been renovated after decades of squatters. There was a problem with the jam factory though, which is now an upmarket hotel and art gallery.

The jam factory was active in the Victorian period and into the last century. Seems they weren't very good at getting the jam into the jars though. When the newly installed heating was turned on in the hotel guest began to report sticky carpets and walls. They eventually had to close down for a time. The stone walls were saturated with jam! The heating was left on until all of the jam seeped out of the building.

You could say it was jam packed!

Last tour visit of the day was to the Cascade Brewery. Not so keen on Cascade beers- they feel "manufactured"- not made with the artisan love of other old breweries. This feeling was born out by the tour of their factory. Couldn't complain quite so much though when several in the tour group gave me one or two of the "free beer" tokens though. Lots of free beer for me :)

That evening I had a quick, quiet walk around Hobart. Being Tuesday the cinema was half price! So after dinner and a shower I was the ONLY person watching the 10pm showing of Deadpool!