Tasmania

We survived our first big trip down under. We took the ferry to Tasmania. The ship leaves at 8pm and arrives the next morning at 7am. We drove our minivan right onto the ship! Pat and Brody stayed in a cabin and the girls and I were in our own cabin. The ride was extremely rough. Taylor slept through the whole thing. Riley was up until 3 am laughing and hanging on in the top bunk.

We arrived in Devonport, and drove to Stanley. Some of us hiked up to the top of the "Nut" which had an extraordinary view of mountains and the ocean. We drove on to Smithton where we stayed at a lodge with a nice heated pool. Our accommodations went slowly downhill the rest of the trip. The next day we went to a dismal swamp. You had to ride a tube-like slide to get down to the bottom to do your exploring. After that we were on to Strahan. Along the way, we stopped at Cradle Mountain, and did some hiking.

In Strahan we stayed at the Cozy Cabins. Luckily I had talked Pat out of camping, because it was quite chilly here. The kids played on the 40KM beach, and went sledding in the sand dunes. We even caught the tale end of a whale rescue. 27 whales were beached, and they were only able to save 5. It was sad, but also very interesting.

Our next stop was Hobart. Along the way we stopped at Field National Park to look at the Tall Pines. They are the second tallest trees in the world, next to the Redwoods in California.

A definite highlight of Hobart was touring the Cadbury chocolate factory. Pat was hilarious at the end, in the candy store.

Another hilight was the petting zoo. Taylor finally got to get up close with a Koala Bear (among many other animals).

Our last stop before the long drive back up to Devonport for our "cruise" was visiting the Hastings Caves and Thermal Pool. The kids swam here for 3 hours.