Day 2 in Tasmania

Guarding Eaglehawk neck

I should continue writing about Tasmania before I forget everything that we did.  I'm getting far too behind in this blog.  Today, we had a walk in the Kuring-Gai national park, yesterday we saw the fireworks, the day before we hiked in the Lane Cove National Park (which reminded Sha's mum of where she and her friends secretly used to watch the firing squads executing the condemned prisoners). Another rather embarrassing cultural difference was at midnight last night.  At exactly midnight I held out my glass to say cheers, but everyone else was requesting a wish from a God. Sha's mum thought that I was very funny.


On the second day, we checked out of the hotel and then went to look at the chain of dogs that used to stand guard across Eaglehawk bay.  At Eaglehawk bay the land is so narrow that the guard dogs were placed in a line stopping any convicts trying to escape.  The small museum was excellent and Sha's dad sat on a statue of a fierce dog.  We then went on to the Wildlife park to show Sha's parents a Tasmanian devil.  We started with an excellent bird show (but, as always in Australia, the native birds that were just flying around were as interesting

This parrot was not meant to be part of the bird show

as the birds in the show -- we had to wait a while as a huge wedge-tailed eagle flew overhead).  We saw some baby Tasmanian devils.

We then went to the exhibition of "tree cutting and chocolate making" and bought some chocolate.  We checked-in at our hotel (in the style of an old English pub), went for a short walk around and then went to visit Port Arthur.  Port Arthur is massive and impressive!  We started on a boat tour to see what the convicts would have seen as they arrived.  Actually, it looked very nice and pretty.  I'm sure that it didn't in the past!

In the evening we went for a walk to the bay near our hotel and watched some huge sting-rays (or something similar) swim around.  Then we went for a very odd walk in what seemed to be a lost garden.  There were obvious signs of paths, bridges etc., but everything was falling down and we had to push our way through the bushes. 

We saw a lot of wallabies.

Our hotel in Port Arthur

The bay next to our hotel

The first view of Port Arthur

The island of the dead (and a cruise ship)

The rays in the bay