March 10 - Wineglass bay

Today we headed from Hobart to Wineglass Bay. The first part of the ride headed along river, and inland farms. The rest was all along the ocean. It was slightly hazy, but the views were good. We stopped in a little tourist-driven ocean-side town called Swansea to get coffee for Paul and a hot chocolate for me. This was the first place in Australia that we found that served good hot chocolate that was actually chocolatey. And, the cafe had good music - Regina Spekter.

We continued on through the peninsula to Coles Bay which was even more of a tourism town. There were cute colorful houses built on hills, and it wasn't touristy in an American seaside town way, or even Croatian. More understated. But they were definitely capitalizing on the fact that tourists frequented.

From here we headed on to the national park where we got our campsite and headed to the start of the walks. We had lunch out of the campervan with a wallaby and then walked to Wineglass bay lookout. It was about a 30minute walk uphill about 150m, and there were tons of people on the way. The views were worth it, though - Coles bay and the Hazards beach on one side, Wineglass bay on the other, separated by an area called the saddle. Of course, we had to go down to the beach...too pretty not to. So we went down about 500m to the beach. I think it was harder going down than the later trip up about 600 stairs, mainly because of my old knees. Paul disagreed. The stairs weren't really stairs, but branches and rocks positioned strategically. They seemed to go on forever. But the beach made it worthwhile. It was warm out, and the white sand felt so good on the toes!

There were jellyfish washed up on shore, and Paul found a cool spikey fish. We saw shells, and saiilboats, and I had a chat with a man who had come ashore for the day, but was running back to sleep in his yacht overnight.

The way back up the stairs was easier and faster than we thought it would have been, though it was frusterating that you had to go up to the lookout, above the carpark, before you could go back down. But more great views. On the way we saw two couples who would have been in their 60's. They were going slow and steady, but they were doing it. We also met a french guy who was doing 3 nights of camping - he was doing all of these hikes with the tent and bag and supplies for 3 days. Made us feel a bit wimpy.

Our next stop was supper at Richardson's Bistro in the Freycinet Lodge. The lodge was very swanky - cosy but expensive and oh-so-comfortable looking. The bistro was the less expensive of the restaurants offered, though we still spent a lot on an amazing supper. I had a much needed and very appreciated glass of wine and a yummy chocolate tart dessert, and Paul enjoyed an extra round of fries. Mmm.

We next headed to the campsite, which ended up being next to a family set up for 2 weeks. Nice sites, but no isolation, and we were worried a bit about the kids as they cried on past 9. We set up our caravans - we are truly getting to be pros at this. Unfortunately, the toilets were not as nice as our last campgrounds, but they flushed. As we did reading and journal writing, we basked in the comfortable warmth. Finally out of the cold!