Tasmania
It was a day of travel as we would depart Alice Springs en route to Melbourne. We would have a short layover in Melbourne before flying again to Hobart, Tasmania.
Because of its size, we decided to rent a car in Tasmania. This was an “experience” as it was the first time either Photos or I would be driving on the “other” side of the road. The first few moments were wrought with nervousness, uncertainty and a lot of giggling from the both of us as we nursed our rental out of the lot and onto the highway. Thankfully we arrived later in the evening and didn’t have to contend with too much traffic.
It was about a half hour before we arrived in the city, and our first order of business was to find something to eat. We found a restaurant in the Salamanca market area called the Ball and Chain Grill. We shared a home made sausage plate, I had the pork loin, while Photos had a rib eye. The food was very good and certainly hit the spot after a long day of travel.
After dinner we made our way to South Hobart where we checked into our Airbnb, settled in and hit the sack looking forward to a day of new adventures.
Hobart CBD
Our first stop of the day was to visit the central area of Hobart. Our intention was to visit a particular coffee shop called Pilgrim Coffee. Australia has a great coffee culture and Hobart is no different.
We spent an hour exploring the area before getting back in our car for the 20 minute drive to MOMA (Museum of Modern Art).
Mona
We had heard about the Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) prior to visiting and it was on our list of things to do. However depending on who you talk to you could either spend a fully day there or under an hour. The idea is that there are going to be those that will “get it” and those that will think its completely bonkers!
To start the art pieces around the building are already quite interesting and the architecture of the museum is also very cool to look at.
When you go inside, you actually start on the top floor and you need to descend into its “depths” and make your way back up again! This is a very modern museum! At the bottom we were given an Ipod and headphones which we would use to listen/read about the exhibits. Depending on your location inside it would update with information about the nearby exhibits.
I would say that I “got” about half of the exhibits, while I thought the other half was… bonkers. Its certainly worth checking out, if only to be fascinated by what humans can come up with, and what appreciation there is out there for it.
Mount Wellington
Mount Wellington was at the top of our list ever since we decided to visit Tasmania. We’d seen pictures of the view and instantly knew we needed to come here. In planning for today we wanted to ensure we had enough time to see the view during the day, but also spend some time seeing the sunset and the view at night.
We left MoMA in the afternoon and made the half hour drive up the mountain. Its a beautiful drive with many switch backs. Both Photos and I were a bit nervous being on the other side of the road, but still took time to appreciate the view whenever we could!
When we arrived we were amazed at the view. You’re up pretty high and you see all of the city and then some! On the other side (where the sun would set) was a view of the mountain top and additional mountain ranges behind it.
You could look in any direction and see awesomeness! We loved it and ended up spending the whole evening here. Sadly, we had to pack up when our batteries and power started running out in our cameras.
We had been playing with more astrophotography and long exposure evening shots and were about to leave when we bumped into another photographer who had just driven up to shoot the Southern Lights. We had read about this, but given the rarity of it we didn’t expect to see it on our trip. I had accidentally caught some of it on an earlier long exposure shot, but had written off the streak of colour as light pollution, who would have thought!
We had no more power in our cameras, but to know it was possible was certainly an exciting prospect for our next few days.