It looks cold doesn’t it? Well believe me, it was! We spent the long weekend at a B&B in Geeveston (Bears over the mountain). It was a great location in the wilderness of Southern Tasmania. The landscape was breath-taking. It really felt like frontier country. And it felt just a wee bit cold to us.
We travelled to the ‘end of the road’. We were at the southern most tip of Australia. We were now closer to Antartica than to Cairns. And that’s what it felt like. The water was crystal clear but looked positively freezing. The bays were protected and peaceful. Lots of (clearly very tough) families were having their last bit of the summer holidays camping down in this stunning countryside, gathered around roaring camp fires…and then we spotted…a little girl trotting across to the beach in her swimmers with a boogie board under her arm (??really!) and low and behold an ice-cream van! Even if we hadn’t just been sailing the Queensland coast I would still thought it was a tad chilly for swimmers and a dip in the waters of what is basically the southern ocean. That aside it was a magical place.
The whale sculpture is in recognition of the whaling history. During the 1830s there were 4 whaling stations at Cockle Creek. During the 1840s the Crown granted seven leases for the establishment of bay whaling stations in Recherche Bay. But whales had been hunted with pregnant cows and calves indiscriminately slaughtered. They apparently slaughtered the calves first so that the cows would wait around the bay and cry for their young, and then be slaughtered too. Tragic – but a beautiful sculpture.

Joy! We arrived in Hobart and took ourselves off to our accommodation. There was the incident at the airport where I whinged about the car that the rental car had arranged for us, and then negotiated a bigger car, probably won the award for the customer from hell for the day, and basically embarrassed poor Gerhard – but I’ll gloss over that. Oh, and poor Hugo picked up the bug that Oscar had had a few days earlier and (without exaggerating) vomitted from Mooloolaba to Hobart. Poor child.
All that aside…it was a great day. We arrived at our quaint cottage, installed the boys on the pull-out settee infront of the television and popped off to the gorgeous Italian around the corner, walked around the streets overlooking the harbour (so quiet we literally whispered as we walked so as not to disturb the peace) and fell in love with Hobart.
We watched the sun set on Mount Wellington, and the early morning light on the mountain from our kitchen window. It was spectacular.
We spent our time in Hobart finding our bearings and visiting Hobart and a really very good museum – at least, I think we did…Hugo’s bug got me too. Next man down. However, I was back on form for the Saturday morning markets at Salamanca – a must when in Hobart.

What a wonderful way to see the old year out and the New Year in! Let’s hope this next year sees many more exciting adventures for us. Mooloolaba did not let us down – it was a fabulous evening (perhaps a little too fabulous given my sore head this morning!).

We have spent the last couple of weeks in Mooloolaba and we’ve had a lovely time, from the parade of boats up and down the canal before Christmas, to fireworks on Christmas Eve, a very warm bike riding day out at a dam (I must remember to always take at least 10 litres of water with us where ever we go otherwise we are in trouble!) and of course the inevitable playing in the surf and crashing waves.

Anyway, we’ve moved ourselves into the Mooloolah river having got a bit overheated and grumpy with the marina life in the last few days. So here we sit with the breeze blowing across the boat and only a 2 minute zoom across the river to the marina. We are well situated to simply walk five minutes from the marina over the spit and on to the ocean beach. This is where we found ourselves last night.

A brilliant family evening with jugglers and people on stilts, giant slides and live music and an array of kiosks from where to buy your food – so everyone was happy (Gerhard on the German Sausages and Oscar eating freshly baked pizza and Hugo the inevitable ‘something’ with chips).

As we sat on the grassy bank above the beach, kids were charging across the sand, the waves crashed and the atmosphere was just lovely. Incidentally the whole area is cordoned off and bags are checked for alcohol etc. as you enter so there’s a completely non-threatening, family-orientated atmosphere. I’m sure after we’d all gone home and the masses moved in for the later fireworks it all changed a bit!

Anyway, the first fireworks display came on at 8.30 and did us proud. Set off from a barge in the bay, everyone had an amazing view as the sky lit up for 10 minutes and the waves rolled in below.
Afterwards we ambled home and collected our dinghy to make our way back to Sunny Spells with lots of cheery shouts of “Happy New Year” from our fellow yachties. The boys collapsed into bed and we carried on partying with friends from the marina….and before we knew it, it was time for the midnight fireworks. This time we had a wonderful view of them over the top of the marina from the boat.

This morning the sun is shining and it’s hot ( well there’s no change there then!) but we’ve got work to do. The boat needs to be tidied and reprovisioned for our sail out to Tangalooma Island tomorrow. And of course our Christmas lights have got to come down from the mast, and the foredeck, and the life-lines too: they’ve made us giggle each time we’ve made our way home and seen them shining brightly across the marina, but we can’t set the sails with them in place, so that’s the end of them for this year. Happy New Year everyone!