Today is our last full day in Australia and there was no way I was leaving the country without ever seeing a kangaroo. So we started off the day by going to the Wild Life zoo in the Darling Harbour. It was a 20 min walk from our hotel and we pre-bought tickets online last night so we saved a bit of money that way.
It was pretty good. We got to see the quintessential Australian animals so it was exactly what we needed: Tasmanian devils, pandemelons, wallabies, kuckaberras, wombats, a cassowary, echidnas, koalas, quolls, lots of snakes, and finally... kangaroos! We also finally got to see some platypuses and a huge saltwater crocodile! Here are some of my favorite pictures from the zoo, as always you can check out the album for more.
A wallaby:
A cassowary (the third largest bird in the world):
Kangaroos! The guy on the left was hopping all over the place; I have a video of him too.
An echidna:
A Platypus! These little girls were tricky to get pictures of.
Here's the croc:
And another koala picture, because they are so dang cute:
From the zoo we walked over to the Sydney Fish Market. It was really crowded with a ton of tourists, but we managed to pull together some lunch. We ended up sharing some oysters, a lobster tail, and fish & chips. They had some huge crabs there though. And lots of octopus.
The rest of the afternoon was spent grabbing snacks at the hotel and running errands. I wanted to go see if I could find a cheap dress to wear to the opera for tonight. We went to a few stores that were way out of my price range before we wandered into H&M. There I found two dresses! One was $15 and the other was only $5! And that's Australian dollars so I was pretty pleased with that. Now I'll just need to figure out what to toss in order to make space in my bag for those... We were about to walk back to the hotel to get ready but it was pouring! So we grabbed an Uber instead.
We ate dinner at the hotel and then got ready for the opera. Luckily it stopped raining before we had to walk there. The opera is only a ten minute walk but it still would've been less than fun doing that in our nicest clothes.
The opera was great! We had pretty good seats in a side box so we were pretty close to the stage. We decided to see Tosca, which is a classic Italian opera that's set at the end of WWII in Rome. It had a powerful plot and the singing was amazing. It's unlike anything I've ever seen before and it's difficult to describe. It's a little strange at first that it's all in Italian but you get used to it eventually. There are subtitles at the top to help you understand what's going on, if the emotion in the songs doesn't make it clear enough. But I would definitely recommend the experience to someone if they've never seen an opera before to check it out. Plus it was fun getting all dressed up for once. Here's a picture of us right before the opera:
That's all for tonight! Matt and I fly to New Caledonia tomorrow.
That's the first few notes of the Indiana Jones theme song, if you couldn't tell. That's all we heard as we plummeted down in an old mining train car. We were riding the railway at Scenic World down to the bottom, and I'm not really sure why they played the Indiana Jones theme song each time the railway departed. It used to be an old mining car, but then the miners decided to start supplementing their income by taking tourists down in the rail cars to check out the scenic views. It went down at a 52 degree angle and is said to be the steepest passenger train in the world.
Once at the bottom, we did what Indiana Jones would do and explored the rainforest looking for lost artifacts and women to rescue (three sisters, in particular). Although we didn't find any of those things, we did see some interesting plant life like gum trees. I had an epiphany when I realized that kukaberras live in gum trees, and that we heard one two days ago when we were walking.
Then we rode the cable car back up to the top and we got to see some pretty views from there. We grabbed a quick snack and then took the Skyway between the cliff tops above the Jamison Valley. It's the highest cable car in Australia and it has a glass floor to look below. In theory it had beautiful views of Katoomba Falls waterfall and the "Three Sisters", but it was so foggy we really couldn't see much of anything.
We walked along the path for a bit to get a closer look at the water fall before taking Prince Henry Cliff Walk towards the Three Sisters. The Three Sisters is a rock formation and is noted as the Blue Mountains' most spectacular landmark. The entire walk we couldn't see the formation at all, and we were too busy dodging puddles on the stairs to notice much of anything. Once we got to the lookout it did clear out for a second for us to get a foggy picture but that's all we got.
The Three Sisters!!
We had planned to take the Devil's Staircase from there back down into the valley, but due to the weather we decided it probably wasn't worth it. That ended up being a good decision because 10 minutes later it started pouring.
So instead we took the bus back to Katoomba and grabbed a pizza snack before jumping back on the train. We made it back to Sydney where it was raining as well, but luckily the train station is 4 minutes from our hotel so we made it back without getting too wet.
We ate dinner in the lounge and the hotel where we could have free food and drinks. Which is where I am right now as I'm writing this. :)
To quote Indiana Jones- Spiders. Why does it always have to be spiders? (In the original movie Indy said "snakes", but I adapted the quote for our Australian version.)
Today was our beach day! We had breakfast at the hotel again while watching a bit of basketball (glad KU won!). Then we packed up our gear and headed to the beach.
We took the bus to Coogee Beach at first and then walked along the "coastal walk" to Bondi Beach. It was a two hour walk that took us right along several bays and beaches and it was very pretty. It also took us through a beautiful old cemetery right on the water which I thought it was really cool. I find it fascinating to wander through old cemeteries and look at the names and the dates and wonder about the lives of the people buried there. Plus it was just beautiful location; I definitely wouldn't mind being buried there.
We made it to Bondi Beach and first checked out the shops along the water and grabbed a smoothie snack. Then we lounged on the beach for awhile soaking up the few rays we could get; it was mostly cloudy. When the sun finally peaked through Jack and I ran into the water. It had pretty big waves so we enjoyed jumping over and under them for awhile until we were told we needed to either get out of the water or move to a safer location. There were also a ton of surfers out so it was entertaining to watch them out there. I took a few surfing lessons when we were in Hawaii last year and I'd like to give that another go someday when I get the chance.
We grabbed some dinner before leaving there; I got some sushi and the guys ate at a Brazilian place. I spent less than $10 on food today so I was feeling pretty good about that.
We took the bus back to our hotel and came down to the executive lounge for awhile for free drinks/desserts and do our computer things- blogging and research for tomorrow. I added all of Jack's scuba videos to my album and they are amazing so you should check them out. It's the album linked on the top right, and if you sort by recent activity it's a bit easier to identify Jack's videos since I just uploaded them. Otherwise it's sorted by date taken and it gets all mixed in with my mediocre videos. I also added a couple of videos to the Scuba Diving post, Here is a link to that post if you want to check them out. The videos are of the sea turtles and of the first part of our last free dive, they are both also in the album.
I know we've been in Australia for over two weeks, but I feel like being in Sydney really feels like Australia. We woke up early in our hotel room with a view of the Sydney Harbour Bridge to watch the Badgers knock off no. 1 seed Villanova (wohoo!) then went down to the lounge for a free hot breakfast.
Then we walked 3 minutes from our hotel and purchased our Opal cards (public transport cards in Sydney) and hopped on a ferry. I've never ridden a ferry at all, so it was different to ride it for casual public transportation purposes. On the ferry we had great views of the Harbour bridge and of the Sydney Opera House.
We got off at the Cremona Point Wharf and walked along the coastline to the Mosman wharf. It was such a beautiful walk! It had fantastic harbor views, beautiful old houses, and unique pretty flowers. I loved every minute of it, except for maybe when we spotted huge spiders right off or above the path. We even got to go down to an old lighthouse at Robertsons point, where I made Matt go out to take a picture with me and right then there was a big wave and splashed all over us. I wish Jack would've gotten that candid picture! This was right after that happened:
And more from the walk:
After the walk we took the ferry from Mosman wharf back to Circular Quay, the wharf right next to our hotel. From there we walked along the harbor to the Sydney Opera House. We took lots of pictures and then wandered in to check out what was playing. We decided to buy tickets to the opera for Wednesday night! I'm really excited for that. We decided to see Tosca, but we debated for awhile between that and La Boheme. I think both would've been great. But Isn't that crazy?! We're going to see an opera at the Sydney Opera House!
Then we meandered through the botanical gardens as we worked our way indirectly back to our hotel. When we were a few blocks away it started to sprinkle so we rushed back to the hotel to grab afternoon tea. Afternoon tea ended up being mostly candy and not sustainable food like I was hoping, but it got us through the afternoon anyway.
For the afternoon we tossed around several different ideas but ended up riding the bus up to the "little Italy" area, which turned out to be not very Italian. Just a couple of restaurants but nothing like what we've seen in other cities. But we grabbed some really good cheesecake from a place that we read had the "best cheesecake in Sydney". It was really good, but not life-changing. Then we decided we should probably eat some real food so we decided on an Italian place and got some food. We ended up eating our entire dinner backwards: cheesecake, entrees, then salad. Not sure why the salad came out last but it did.
We rode the bus back to our hotel area and decided to walk around a bit in an area known as "The Rocks" which is mostly bars and restaurants. Not too much going on on a Sunday night but it was really nice out and good to walk off dinner a bit.
That's pretty much it for today! I took a ton of pictures today and struggled to narrow it down on what to include here, so check out the album for more if you're interested.
It's funny cuz that's pretty much all we did today- sweat. We had a relaxed day in Cairns today before our flight this evening for Sydney. It was super hot and sticky so it was difficult to find the motivation to do much, especially since we've all been pretty busy the last few days and needed a rest. I was sweating while just sitting still in the shade.
So we hung out at the hostel for most of the day. They had free hot breakfast so I had pancakes with Nutella, yum! We did laundry, I worked on my blog, we watched some March Madness (dang Cats), I reviewed my finances, things like that. We needed a down day. So not much to write about and not many pictures to share. Here's one of the hostel common area outside where we hung at most of the day trying to catch a breeze.
Then we hopped on a plane and now we're in Sydney! We're actually staying at one hotel for the duration of our stay here, which is five nights, and therefore a new record! It's going to feel like we moved in.
Jack and I were reviewing our photos and videos from our time on the GBR and he has some really great videos. He recorded each of our dives in their entirety and he has a much nicer camera than I do. They are incredible! It almost feels like you're right there with us. So I'm really excited to share those with you hopefully soon whenever we can get them uploaded. They are sizable videos so it'll take some good wifi bandwidth.
That's all for now!
Update to original post- We got to our hotel for the next few nights and it's super fancy! We're staying at the Marriott at the harbor; Jack is splurging and using points so we're staying for free! We have a view of the Sydney Harbour Bridge and everything. So even though we got here late we decided to go check out the night life since it's our only Saturday night in Sydney. We strolled around and got our first glimpse of the opera house!
That's when it started to drizzle so we ducked into a nearby bar and split a pizza and shared some Pimm's. We first had Pimm's back in London, so that with the rain made it feel almost like we were back in London.
What an exciting few days!! I'm so sorry I wasn't able to write for awhile; the boat I've been on for the last few nights did not have wifi. But I'm excited to tell you about all of my adventures while diving the Great Barrier Reef!
Jack and I decided to do a 3 day/2 night live aboard option so we could really get a good bit of diving in. We went through Pro Dive Cairns. We both got our Open Water and Adventure Diver PADI certifications as well during the trip. The boat is mostly made up of others getting their Open Water certs as well, and there are others who are getting advanced certs, some who are already certified and just diving, and others who are just snorkeling. One guy on the boat is from Tulsa! He works on the army base there. What a small world!
The water conditions have been unbelievable. The water is super warm, about 30 degrees Celsius. We don't even wear wet suits but only what they call "stingers", which protects your skin from coral and small jelly fish, as well as the sun. The water visibility has also been amazing; they say it's been about 50 meters! And the wind was pretty tame as well so the boat rocking wasn't too bad. Matt was talking to a guy while we were gone and he said he doesn't think there's ever been a series of 3 days so calm on the GBR ever and that we might've set a record.
The food was pretty good. Every meal they had something hot as well as some lighter options. They do a good job of keeping us fed with snacks as well between dives. The crew is very friendly. Accommodations are pretty basic but that's okay since we don't spend much time in our rooms.
I wrote at the end of each day, so I'm talking about each day on the day that it happened.
Day 1
On our first day they picked us up from our hotel bright and early and whisked us away to the shop to store our luggage and sign in. Then we were taken to the docks where we were able to climb aboard! It was about a 3 hour cruise at first just to get out to the reef, and during that time we went through safety briefings and set up our equipment. We also had some time to enjoy the open sea view, and we got to see some dolphins playing about as well!
We did two dives and a snorkel trip today. Both of our dives consisted mostly of doing skills since we are getting our certifications, but they both also had time to explore as well. We went down to a depth of about 10 meters today. On our first dive we got to hold and touch a sea cucumber which was really cool. I actually got stung on the hand by a small jelly fish. They were really small and clear, hard to see. I didn't even see the one that stung me but I saw others. It didn't hurt really, just startled me. Our second dive was in the same location and this time we got to see a handful of Dory fish from "Finding Nemo", and we also got to see a sting ray on the bottom!
Then we went to a new location and we got to do a snorkel. It was a great snorkel location with coral structures going almost all the way up to the surface level. There was a ton of life as well; corals, sea plants, fish, giant clams. I have some videos and pictures from the snorkel.
This evening we had to do a bit of paperwork for our certifications, but then we got to relax on the boat. We got to watch lots of big fish and several sharks swimming around the boat for awhile. And the stars are beautiful!
Day 2
Our first dive this morning was at 0730. We continued working on our skills. One of them is to completely remove you mask while at the bottom and then put it back on and clear it. We finished doing that and then swam about a bit and we found a sea turtle! It was amazing. I was sad I didn't have my camera with me. It swam about 3 feet directly below me. Then we also saw some "Nemo" fish (aka clown fish). That was really cool, but then unfortunately our dive got cut short because one of the girls couldn't control her buoyancy and went straight to the surface.
Our second dive this morning we finished up doing some skills, since it was our last certification dive. We did some navigation skills and then completely removed/replaced our scuba while in the water. This was our deepest one so far; we got down to about 15 meters. This time I saw a giant clam.
After that dive we officially got our Open Water certifications! Yay!
Our third dive of the day was our first one as certified divers, and therefore we could just dive with our buddies instead of a group. This was much more enjoyable since you're not constantly bumping into one of the other 6 divers in your group and you can go where you please. They briefed us prior to the dive on where to go to see what. Jack and I had a great dive! First we saw some giant clams. Then we successfully navigated towards the "Mickey mouse" structure, where we saw the cave that a giant sea turtle lives (more about that later), and we got to swim through the narrow tunnel out. Then we swam north a bit and before we got to our second tunnel to swim through we saw a barracuda! It was really big and just staring at us, quite intimidating. I felt a little uncomfortable turning my back to it. But then we swam through the tunnel which was good fun. We started to swim towards the area known as the "fish bowl" but we noticed Jack was at the turning point level of air so we decided to head back. This is where our navigational skills broke down a bit. We way overshot the boat and eventually we had to surface to locate it again. Sounds like just about every other newly certified diver did the same so we didn't feel too bad. We located the ship and then descended a few meters and swam right back. On the way we saw two sea turtles! I have some videos and pictures from this dive but unfortunately my camera died early on straight after the clams, so I missed quite a bit.
video of sea turtles!
Our forth dive was our night dive. This was very exciting. Jack and I both decided to continue our education and get the Adventure certification while we're board so we switched instructors. The night dive was new and exciting, although we didn't get to see any sharks which I was disappointed about. The night before they had been everywhere. But we swam around a bit and pointed our torches (aka flashlights). We saw some interesting fish. And we went back to the turtle cave (they call the turtle Brian) and we saw him in there sleeping! Biggest turtle I've ever seen. They say he's over 150 years old and he's the dominant male turtle in the area. He was huge! That was definitely the highlight of the dive for me.
Day 3
Our first dive of today was our deepest dive, and it was our "Deep Dive" for training. We went down to 29 meters, which is about 91 feet. Our instructor had brought down a squishy ball so we could see what the pressure did to the ball. It was amazing! It was all caved in. We also brought a color card and a torch so we could see what happens to the colors that deep. It was really cool to see how the reds/purples faded away. On this dive we spotted a sting ray and a flounder. A spangled-emperor kept hanging around us swimming right by our faces the entire dive. It was close to 2-foot long and about a foot tall. It was funny for awhile, but then it was like a fly that wouldn't bugger off.
Our next dive was our last dive for our Adventure certification and it was focused on navigation. We did a few navigational skills and then we were able to have a free dive. We saw some bump head parrotfish, a baby yellow box fish, a white-tip shark (!), and more clown fish. I was excited that we finally saw a shark while diving. I got so excited that I accidentally turned my camera off and couldn't get it turned back on to get a picture of it.
The third dive of the day was our last dive of the trip (sad face). This was a strictly fun dive so Jack and I were able to wander about on our own. This was at a great reef with so much life around. Everywhere we turned there were schools of fish. Some notable ones that we saw were bumphead parrotfish, anemonefish, and diagonal-banded sweetlips. We successfully navigated our way back to the boat with just a couple of minutes to spare in our max dive time.
Here's a video Jack took of the start of our last dive!
Then we all packed up our equipment and ate some lunch as we began our cruise back to Cairns. It was really a great trip and I feel really good about how many dives we got to do and that we got two certifications. I wasn't sure how either Jack or I would do with living aboard a boat- if we would get sea sick or just get a little crazy from not being able to see land. But we both did great! We never got seasick or anything, perhaps it was the Dramamine. I also thought that after 9 straight dives that we would be a bit sick of diving by now, but I think we both just want to do it more. Since most of our dives were training dives we only got 2 strictly fun dives and I think we could definitely use a couple more of those.
We got back to Cairns and met up with Matt at our hostel where we're staying tonight. It's called Mad Monkeys and it's brand new and very nice. It's very clean and everyone has their own locker. It has a pool with cabanas and a bar area under a huge tent that's lit with tiki torches at night. It's a cool place. And the best part- fast wifi! So Jack and I hopped in the pool for a bit and then took a proper shower. We cleaned up and went out to a nice dinner.
While we had been on a boat diving Matt went on a boat fishing and caught several large fish. He ended up keeping a Fingermark and a Barramundi, which the latter he gave to a nice restaurant to prepare for us tonight. So we all got to try Matt's fish and it was delicious. They prepared two courses for us; the first had some appetizers which included the fish fried up and also sashimi. It was surprisingly good! Then Matt and Jack each had part of a filet which I tried and that was really good too. So that was a nice treat for us to come back to!
Then we meandered back to the hostel and enjoyed the people-watching; it's Friday night of St. Patrick's day so the crowd is a bit rowdy. We're all tired and didn't feel much like participating in the festivities. Happy St. Patrick's day everyone!
I finally uploaded all of my photos from the last few days, including the photos from the Barefoot Tours the day before we left. A lot of the underwater videos don't work for some reason; I blame the cheap knockoff camera I bought. You get what you pay for I guess.
Here's just a couple of random pictures; there's many more in my album. I don't think I ended up with a picture of any of the sea turtles, or the shark, or the barracuda. :(
Pro Dive Cairns did sponsor part of our trip, but all opinions are my own.
What a busy day! Matt and I had decided to do an all-day tour today so we went with the top one we found on Trip Advisor, which is Barefoot Tours.
We had a wonderful day! They picked us up directly from our hotel and off we went. There were eleven of us on the tour; poor Matt was the only guy. Our tour guide was great; he kicked off a couple of ice breakers so we could all get to know each other. One of them was asking what is our spirit animal. I said mine is a duck. Do you guys know why? Another one was if we scrunch of fold. Can you guess what that is about?
Our first stop of the day was Lake Eachem, and to get there we went up a very twisty road to get up to what he referred to as the table-lands (since it's elevated but flat, I imagine). We were told it was a crocodile-infested volcano lake. It really was in the crater of an old volcano, and supposedly there really is a crocodile in it. But he told us that's just because some guy put a small crocodile in there. I never saw it though. After soaking in the super-clear water for a bit we had morning tea with some fruit, which was quite lovely.
Then we continued on to Diner Falls, which was a nice little waterfall where we could get in at the bottom. If you sat right below the water it gave you a nice back rub. Also, behind one area of the waterfall was a little cave under the water. It was a bit difficult to get to since you had to fight your way through the current pushing you out and the water rushing down, but I finally made it there on my third attempt. I was the only one from the group who made it even though several others tried, so I was quite proud of that! It was a neat little area where you could sit and watch the water fall in front of you. I did have my underwater camera with me and I took videos, but when I transferred them to my phone it didn't seem to work so I think I might've lost them, sadly. Diner Falls also had an area where you could look above a little pool area from 53 meters above.
Then we went on to Millaa Millaa Falls. This was a picture perfect waterfall. We were all able to swim behind the waterfall here and take pictures. It was a lovely area so we hung around there a bit. We also practiced flipping our hair into the water to make a circle of water, which was entertaining. We have lots of pictures of that.
Our last stop of the day was Josephine Falls. This was a super fun stop since the falls here have made a natural water slide. We swam to the rock part and shimmied our way up a bit since the rocks were really slippery. Then you could walk to the top and slide down. It was so fun! Again, I had lots of videos of both me and Matt doing this but I think I lost them all. :(
Then we had afternoon tea with some wonderful Tim Tam cookies (which are cookies famous in Australia). Then we drove back to Cairns where our tour guide dropped us all off again. From the time we were picked up to the time we were dropped off was about 12 hours and filled with fun. Our tour-guide, Brett, did a lot to make our driving time enjoyable. He had lots of interesting facts and cools stories that he shared with us. He also played some great music for us to listen to; his own playlist that he had created. He also knew all of the tips and safety guidelines when we went to each location, so we always knew what to do. Another really cool thing they do is that our guide took pictures all day and they publish them all to Facebook so that we can all download them for free. I really appreciate them doing that, especially since I lost most of the ones that I took.
Here's a picture of part of our drive:
Once we got back we grabbed some quick dinner with Jack and then got ready for the next few days. Jack and I leave in the morning for our 3 day/2 night Great Barrier Reef scuba diving adventure, so we have big days coming up! I'm not sure how the wifi will be on the boat so there is a chance I may not be able to post every day. But I'm sure I'll have lots of great things to tell you when I can!
Barefoot Tours sponsored our tour today, but all opinions are my own.
We made it to Cairns this morning! It's so much hotter here than it was in Tasmania. Even at night it's almost 90! There are palm trees everywhere and it feels like a tropical paradise. We're staying at the seaside Double Tree, courtesy of Jack's points! Wooo, points! It's really nice and easy walking distance to everything; Cairns is pretty compact.
View from the room:
We got settled into our room and then we walked to the dive shop with whom I'm diving in a few days to get my paperwork filled out and equipment fitted. We grabbed a light lunch by splitting a sandwich and a smoothie and then we went down to the lagoon which is a really cool area. Since Cairns doesn't really have a beach they've instead put in a huge pool area right along the water. It has shaded areas and water fountains and zero depth entry areas. Also right across the street were a bunch of restaurants and things. So we just hung out there for a couple of hours by soaking up some sun while staying cool in the water.
We met up with Jack in the evening and we all grabbed dinner and then picked up a few groceries. The next few days are going to be really busy so I'm hoping to get a good night's sleep tonight!
Oh, I forgot to explain the title of the post. As we were walking around this afternoon we heard this crazy loud screeching noises coming from some trees. We looked up and saw hundreds of bats! They were huge! The biggest bats I've ever seen in my life by far. And they had little monkey-like faces. It was so bizarre. I have pictures and a video (to capture the noise) but they really don't do it justice. We saw a few of them fly and they had a 4 ft wingspan!! Apparently they are large fruit bats native to the area. We had to look it up. Here's a link to a google image search for the ones we saw.
Not a ton to write about today since we spent most of the day driving. It was a rainy morning and we knew we had to drive back to Hobart today but we weren't quite sure what else to do. So we decided on a whim to take the long way back and stop at Wineglass Bay. Not our best idea...
After our free breakfast we checked out of our airbnb and drove the three hours to Wineglass Bay. It was looking promising since it had actually stopped raining despite the dreary forecast. But once we got there we realized that you can't actually drive directly to Wineglass Bay, you have to park and walk there, which it's about a 1.5 hour return walk. We didn't have that much time since we had to return our rental car in Hobart before six, so unfortunately we just had to skip it.
We grabbed some lunch in Cole's Bay with the view of the water. We split the fish and chips platter.
Then we continued our drive back down to Hobart. We successfully returned our rental car and then Ubered to our airbnb. Wow! This is the nicest place we've stayed so far. It's a beautiful house up on a hill overlooking the bay. Both the house and the view are stunning. I'm almost sad that we're only staying here one night.
We decided to just walk to the closest restaurant since we didn't have a car and we ended up at a hotel bistro. It was a bit pricey and I wasn't that hungry so I had a dessert for dinner. Because I'm an adult and I can! Matt had the scallops.
We started our day this morning with a brisk 50 minute walk around Leven Canyon. First we walked up an incline to the highest vantage point of the canyon, then we walked down over 700 steps (I was glad we didn't have to go up that) to get closer to the canyon floor, then we had to walk back up the incline to the car park. It was a nice walk with some good views and a nice way to get the day started.
Then we rewarded ourselves with some lovely chocolate! We went to House of Amver's where they have great chocolate. They even had sample fudge and truffles, and a machine were you could sample each of their chocolate chips: milk, white, and dark. They were all delicious. Obviously I had to purchase a few things.
From there we went to the town of Latrobe, where we ate a picnic lunch along the river and looked for platypuses. We never did see any, unfortunately. Then we went to Ashgrove Tasmanian Farm to check out their dairy products. They had a bunch of cheese to sample, and also had butter, milk, and cream. We really enjoyed the cheese so we bought some of that.
We moved on to Mole Creek caves and decided to do a cave tour in Marakoopa Cave. It was a cool cave with a couple of rivers running through it, many different types of rock formations, and also glowworms. So essentially it was like combining the last two caves we saw together. So we were slightly less impressed since we had just been in both different types of caves recently, but it was a nice way to combine the two.
We made our way back to our airbnb for some dinner, then we headed back out to head to the northern coast of the island. We got to Burnie shortly before 8, which was perfect timing to see the small penguins up there. It was at the Little Penguin Observation Center where they just have volunteers come out each night to show and tell people the penguins that are there. It was really cool to see them coming up out of the water and back to their dens. It was also an interesting time of year to go because we got to see a couple of chicks as well as some of the older ones molting. All my pictures are tinted reed because of the lights the volunteers were using; apparently the red color doesn't hurt the penguins' eyes.
On our way back home we got to see a bunch more wildlife! We saw a few more devils and wallabies, and also a few things we were having trouble identifying. So that was exciting! It's amazing how much everything comes alive at night. You really have to drive much slower when it's dark to avoid hitting anything. This was the only picture I got, since most everything just moves so quickly. But these two just hung out in the middle of the road right in front of us. I think the one on the right is a possum, but I'm not sure about the one on the left.
