We arrived by bus in Hobart yesterday, checked into the Astor Hotel, and decided to relax instead of rushing off to a tour.

The Astor Hotel is the oldest hotel in Hobart.  It started in 1922.  The woman, Tilly, who has been running the hotel for over 30 years is a stitch.  I had a lot of fun talking with her.

Rose and I went down to the pier for lunch and to check out the Bruny Island Tour that I signed us up to do.  She wanted to find a yarn shop to buy wool yarn for her daughter.

I had my phone set to the Cubs game.  Wow – was it tense.  I got so excited when they won.  I was cheering in the yarn shop and then went down the street to tell everybody I met.  Some people didn’t know what I was talking about, but said that they were happy for me.  Others got excited right with me.

We were suppose to rent a car (Aussies say ‘Hire” a car) for Saturday afternoon and go to see a women, Pip, who we met when we did the Monk’s and Mystic’s dance thing in Alice Springs.  Although I knew I would not have any trouble driving on the left side of the road, Rose got very nervous.  I was pretty surprised when she just cancelled our rental car.  So we will be staying in Hobart for an extra 2 days.

I had arranged to meet a man named David to do a tour of the Hobart Synagogue.  He was kind enough to meet me at 8:30 last night.The synagogue is located in Argyle Street, Hobart, and the land on which it stands was originally part of the garden of former convict  Judah Solomon. It has a seating capacity of 150 and features hard benches at the back of the building for the Jewish convicts who in the early days were marched in under armed guard.

 

The photograph in the lower right corner is the original home of Judah Solomon.  It is now a police station.

It took me a long time to complete yesterday’ post so I was up very late.

This morning we walked back to the pier for our trip to Bruny Island.  We boarded a bus which took us to the ferry dock.

Once we arrived on Bruny Island, he drove us to the Neck.  Bruny is actually 2 islands (North and South) because the narrow strip of land between them was very often covered with water.  Somehow the land was built up so they are now connected at The Neck.  There is a memorial there that is dedicated to Truganini who was an Aboriginal woman who lived from 1812 – 1878.

Most of the people on the bus walked up to the view-point.

This is a photo of Ray and myself.  He and I sat next to each other on the bus.  He lives in Sydney and was traveling with friends.

Rose and I walked back down to the beach below.  You can get an idea of how many stairs we walked up to the view from this photo.

Near the beach we saw Fairy Penguin holes but we did not see any Fairy Penguins.

Next we stopped at Adventure Bay for fresh blueberry muffins and hot chocolate.  I walked down to the beach near the restaurant.

I took a photo of another variety of  Banksia flowers.  I love these.

The 3 hour wilderness cruise was wonderful.  They gave us very long rain coats to use.  Mine came down to my ankles. I had a seat at the back of the boat.

Usually I like to be in the front, but there was an advantage to being in the back. The people in the front  had to wear seat belts, but we  were allowed to stand up anytime, I stood up the entire 3 hour trip.

They took us to see caves and archways.

They drove the boat through these towers.

You can see another boat come through the towers.

The walls were pretty high.

There was an underground cave.  When there was any waves near it, it sprouted water.

We saw an Oyster Catcher on the rock.  The captain of the boat said it was rare to see one alone.

Another photo of rocks formations in the water.

And one with an arch in it.

The captain of the boat pointed out that he thought a natural part of this rock looked like Captain Hook.

There were several black and white cormorants and one black one near them.

We saw Australian seals and New Zealand seals.  They live on separate parts of the land and don’t mix.

Somebody spotted whales spouting in the distance so we took off into the Southern Ocean and watched the whales breaching.  It was very exciting, but too fast and a bit too far away for photos.

What great fun it was to have the wind in my face and the water spraying on me as we bounced through the water.

I really enjoyed seeing all of the rock formations.

When the exploration was finished, we went back to Adventure Harbor for lunch. We stopped at the chocolate factory and, of course, I bought fudge.

I was sorry that we did not have enough time to stop at the famous Bruny Island Cheese factory or at Get Shucked (a drive through oyster place).

The bus driver told us about a bar called Hope and Anchor where he thought there would be live music so Rose and I went there for dinner tonight.  The woman playing acoustic guitar was great.  Rose went home at about 9:30, but I stayed to dance with a couple of women. We were the only ones dancing tonight.  They were concerned about my walking back to the hotel by myself, but I felt perfectly safe.  I had a great time.

Well it is midnight again and time to hit the sack.