Rachel and Mike in Australia

Little did I know that Tasmania had lots more to offer than just the Tasmanian devils. Tasmania had some absolutely gorgeous landscapes to see. And we really lucked ‘in’ with the weather (down here lucked ‘out’ means things didn’t go as you’d like). We had had two weeks of cold and rainy weather in Sydney (highs ~17C, lows ~10C, which doesn’t sound too cold, but they don’t centrally heat or insulate houses here, so it felt cold). In Taz, we had beautiful blue skies all weekend and pretty warm weather. Our first afternoon, we biked about 10 km north of Hobart to Moorilla Vineyards.

On the way back from Moorilla Vineyard

The winery is pretty uppity, trying to be very artistic and boutique. I felt like quite the boorish American rolling up sweaty and carrying a bike helmet, but I’m glad they let us in. The wines were all good. They didn’t taste terribly interesting but they had the most amazing smells. You could actually get a scent of the fruit or elderflower or a variety of other things wine labels say you should smell, but you never do. And they’ve recently begun making microbrew beer (which is very rare here). They had some descriptions about how awesome the beer was that ended with the phrase “an experience previously unavailable in beer.” With a statement like that, we had to try them. A couple were really good, but I don’t know about a “previously unavailable” experience.

Our second day in Hobart, we took a bus halfway up Mt Wellington and picked up a trail to hike the rest of the way. It was a really fantastic hike. Where we started was rain forest with tons of fern trees. As we got higher, it turned into primarily eucalyptus trees. We had our eyes out for koalas but instead saw lots of little black lizards and red-legged spiders (turns out koalas don’t live on Tasmania). We also saw our first Australian snake. I have no idea what kind it was. I saw big, black, and scary-looking, which was enough to turn me around yelling and running away. Luckily, that scared the snake off so we were able to continue sans problem. We got some great views from the top of Mt Wellington and then hiked back down a different trail that took us along the ridge where there were all these red rocks and low flowering shrubs reminded me of the southwest U.S. And at the end back in Hobart, we enjoyed a well-earned taste of fish & chips right on the docks.

Top of Mt Wellington

The next day we drove (on the left side of the road!) down to the Tasman peninsula where we hiked out to Cape Huay, which was another beautiful hike.

Cape Huay cliffs

It was through lots of wildflowers and then out along some rocky cliffs that drop a couple hundred meters down to the ocean—pretty spectacular. That hike ended on a beach that had some of the finest, softest sand I’ve ever felt…and it serenaded you as you walked (or jigged!).  Hopefully a click on the link below will bring up a quick video of it:   Rachel’s musical feet….

I went down and met Mike in Tasmania at the end of his cruise (which with some pestering I think he’d write a blog about) for a long weekend. I can’t say Tasmania was somewhere I would have thought about visiting if not for Mike’s cruise. I didn’t even know it was a state of Australia; I thought it was its own country. It was started as a penal colony of the penal colony — a place to send re-offenders to do some of the hardest labor of collecting timber and mining coal. I’ll write more in another post about the history and beauty, but for now, I’ll cut to the charismatic megafauna.

The devil looking longingly at some small children right before feeding time

We visited the Tasmanian Devil Conservation Park, which has a bunch of bizarre Australian animals including kangaroos, wallabys, and of course Tasmanian devils. The devils are perhaps the most ferocious of the marsupials. One of the rangers was telling us that the Tasmanian devil jaw is 90% as strong as a crocodiles (human’s jaws are an order of magnitude weaker). We were there for a feeding, and the devils had no problem chomping right through wallaby bones. It was pretty gross! When they’re not tearing apart carcasses, they’re really cute animals, about the size of a beagle. Apparently devils used to be found all over Australia, but now they’re only found on Tasmania and that population is really struggling because of a cancer that has emerged in the last few years. The cancer can be transferred between animals during fighting or mating and kills an animal within about 5 months.

Two cute devils

They also have a bunch of kangaroos and wallabys (that look like small kangaroos). They have this big enclosed field that you can walk in…and that’s where the kangaroos and wallabys are…just hopping right around you (probably around 75 total). If you are there at feeding time, the rangers let you feed the animals, so Mike and I both had kangaroos eat out of our hands! It was neat to get so close to them. They weren’t overly interested in being fed by humans, which part of me thought was a really good retaining of their animal instincts. Mike pointed out though that it’s probably more a function of them being very well fed. There were a number that had joeys, ranging from seemingly newborns that looked like a little hairless greyhound head poking out of the pouch to full-on teenagers where I could just see a foot sticking out but that had to have been nearly a third the size of the momma kangaroo based on the added bulge. It made carrying around a human pregnancy look like a piece of cake!

Unfortunately the camera battery died after this shot, so it's the only 'roo shot I got.

P.S. So after my complaints about the way they do things differently here on the last post, I have to be fair and say that I much prefer airport security here. You don’t have to show your ID a hundred times (or even once with self check-in) and you don’t have to take off your shoes or sweater!

Look at those devilish grins!

There was an editorial in last week’s local paper on the U.S. vice presidential debate. The article argued that the Republicans had done a wonderful job of managing expectations, such that everyone was expecting Sarah Palin to flop. So when she didn’t fall to pieces, everyone was impressed, even if she didn’t do much more that stick to prepared sound bites. Last week was a very frustrating one for me, and I am wondering if I did a poor job managing my expectations. The predominant language here is English, it’s not a 3rd world country, and I’ve moved four times in the last two years…so how hard could it be to get settled in Australia? Well, as it turns out, a lot harder than I thought it would be! Because so many things are different than I expect, it takes me ten times longer to do things, since I try and do them one way, only to figure out that way won’t work, then I figure out the right way, and try again the right way. And it hasn’t helped that the morning after we moved to our new place, Mike left for a research cruise in Tasmania, so I’ve been dealing with it all by myself.

For example, before Mike left, he and I were hanging out with some of Oscar’s housemates. We were running low on beer, so Mike and I offered to get some more since we had to go to the supermarket anyway. We bought two six packs of beer, and the price was A$35 for two non-premium 6-packs (a 6-pack of Corona goes for A$22). We couldn’t believe it. The beer prices in the pubs were about the same as back home, how were the store prices double? It was a sad walk back, thinking beer might have to be considered a luxury item. It seemed particularly odd considering what a beer-loving nation Australia is purported to be. Well, the mystery was solved when we got back to Oscar’s. Our mistake was buying 6-packs. Cases of beer go for around $45, but they charge a big premium on 6-packs. I don’t really understand why, but that’s the way it is. And this is just one of many snags we’ve encountered. Some of the other bizarre differences that have caused me confusion and wasted time: the phone jacks don’t look anything like U.S. phone jacks, a bus that runs the exact same route will have a different route number depending on the time of day, the credit check to obtain a cell phone contract seems to have more stringent ID requirements than for a work visa, and perhaps my favorite, the street numbers don’t jump to the next hundred at the end of a block and don’t track with the other side of the street, so you can be at 10 Darling St and 437 Darling St is directly across from you! I’m sure I’ll figure it all out soon enough. In the meantime, I just have to try to remember their favorite phrase around here: No worries mate.

An Australian phone jack.

Love my iPhone...which required 3 attempts before I finally had enough of the 'right' forms of ID for them to sell it to me (U.S. ID doesn't get you diddly!).

Disclaimer: Vegetarians and animal lovers may find the following text and images disturbing.

On Sunday we were feeling a bit like celebrating after finding an apartment. At Oscar’s house there’s a beautiful gas grill. So we thought, what more appropriate way to celebrate than a good Aussie barbeque. We headed to the supermarket to get stuff to grill and were checking out the various options, when one jumped out at us: pre-marinated kangaroo kebabs. Now, at this point I gave a little pause. I mean, I think of kangaroos as happy hopping creatures symbolic of my new homeland. Mike on the other hand was sold. He was really excited to try the kangaroo and pointed out that it was cheaper than beef and it came with a green eco-label…so how could I argue? Yes that’s right, my first sighting of any of the native Australian animals was on my dinner plate (makes me feel like a bit of a barbarian). Actually that’s not quite true; we had previously seen an Ibis in one of Sydney’s parks. Anyway, we grilled the ‘roo kebabs, which were pretty good, tasted mostly like beef. I don’t know that I’ll be able to make them a regular part of my diet, but now at least I can say I’ve tried. I have a feeling that before long, Mike’s going to want to try another Australian tradition of ‘eating the shield.’ Australia’s coat of arms consists of an emu and a kangaroo and both are fair game for human consumption. If you’re totally grossed out, let me give you a few of the facts provided by the green label about why ‘roo eating in a good choice for the environment:

1. Kangaroos are soft-footed animals, so damage to the land is far less than that of sheep and cattle.
2. Kangaroos need less food than sheep and cattle, and can better adapt to drought conditions.
3. Kangaroos don’t produce methane the way sheep and cows do. Methane is an greenhouse gas and apparently methane emissions from farm animals account for about a quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas production. Report author of “Paths to a Low Carbon Future” Dr Mark Diesendorf said reducing beef consumption by 20 per cent and putting Skippy on the dinner plate instead would cut 15 megatonnes of greenhouses gases from the atmosphere by 2020.

If you’re still grossed out, I promise that if you come visit we’ll make sure the only kangaroos you see are at the Taronga Zoo!

So many beasts to choose from...

Mmmm...kangaroo kebabs!

Mike and the Ibises in Hyde Park