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Day 4 ~ 25 Dec - Hobart

It's not Saturday, but it's Christmas Day, so we are going to do Christmas Day parkrun. There's normally one which would be within walking distance for us, but not today. The one we are going to is actually a very similar distance in a straight line, but it's on the other side of the estuary, so quite a long way by road and we'll need to take the car.

There's a little bit of early cloud, but the forecast is for sunny skies. We walk past a few of the boats in the marina to get to the car park.


This one is what we nautical experts call "a good green colour!"


"Lady Nelson" needs a bit more detail, though. She's a replica of a ship built in England at the end of the 18th century to carry out surveying work in New South Wales. In 1983, the Tasmanian Sail Association announced a plan to build a replica, and the new Lady Nelson was launched in 1988. It's both a tourist attraction and a training vessel, so you can take a 90-minute tour round the harbour or join the volunteer crew and work your way up to Captain if you like.


This isn't actually a beach parkrun, but the start is only a few bushes away from the beach.


Some runners are starting to assemble now.


A pigeon with pretentions?

It's a Galah, a type of cockatoo, and it's one of the most widespread birds in Australia. However, it was originally endemic to the mainland, and only introduced to Tasmania in the mid-19th century. More recently, it's been introduced to NZ too. Read more about it in Wikipedia, including the interesting fact that it is the only species in the monotypic genus Eolophus.

A bunch of them are paying no attention to the parkrunners but we Brits are certainly paying attention to them.


I suppose it has to be done.

Amanda's shirt says "Bushy" on it, which unsurprisingly intrigues some of the locals. They all seem very nice, though, so she doesn't mind talking to them.

So let's run! The route is an out-and-back along a path just in from the shore. It's a bit undulating, and the sun is coming up so it's quite warm. It's Christmas, Jim, but not as we know it.

[Later: I go to the Flickr group page to see if there are any photos of us, and find that it has 12 members and one generic photo that was posted when the gorup was formed in 2018; although the photo itself dates from 2012!]

Parkrun done, it's back to Somerset to shower and change, then we're going to drive up to Mount Wellington (aka 'kunanyi') to go walking with Jo and Meta.

They went there a couple of days ago, and said it was easy to park at the top, but that was a couple of days ago! All is well until we are close to the summit, then suddenly it's a massive kerjunk and total standstill. It takes forever to get to the car park, and then there are no spaces. However, we noticed roadside parking not far back on our way up, so rather than loiter hopefully for who knows how long, we just drive back half a mile or so.

[J&M get lucky and find somebody leaving right in front of them.]


They're a cautious bunch, these Aussies. As we remember from 2008, Crocodile Dundee is not very representative.


It's a dangerous place, the trig station.


Quite a view looking back down. This part of Hobart is a bit further north than where we're staying, which is out of shot to the right. The bridge you can see is the Bowen Bridge, not the Tasman Bridge which we have now driven across several times, and will do a few more times yet.


And now we're off for our walk among these interesting rocks. The track leads almost due south, so it's imaginatively named the "South Wellington Track".


We have reached a suitable point for a group photo, we think. Time to meander back.


They clearly don't get earthquakes here.

On our return to the start, we part ways again, and Amanda and I drive a little way down to a place where we can take another walk through some woods to a waterfall.


I wonder if St Raphael is the patron saint of waterfalls... probably not, but this is where we start. It's a place with real history, though:
Regular strawberry feasts were held from 1892 to raise funds for the building and maintenance of this picturesque church.
What?

Well that's what it says here.


It's a nice clear path, so long as you don't have a phobia for tree ferns.


No, this isn't a tunnel on the trail, just a tree with a hole. It does look like a tunnel on the trail, though.


Ok, it's not going to give Niagara or Victoria or Iquazu any sleepless nights, but it's worth the visit.


Time for a selfie.


Some of the water here is abstracted to supply the town.

And would you believe it? Fern Tree named Tasmania’s best-tasting tap water for 2022! It's held on to the title in 2023 and 2024 as well. We know none of this as we walk past.

I can't say we've done a critical taste test, but we can certainly say that the tap water in our apartment is not so much in a different league as playing an entirely different game to Thames Water back home.

[In fairness, I can't think of anywhere in the world that tap water is both safe to drink and worse tasting than Thames. As I think I mentioned in another blog, I was one of the very first kids on the UK block with a Brita jug water filter back in the 80s, because Thames Water has always tasted horrible.]


Back at the apartment, Jo and Meta join us for drinks and nibbles on the terrace before Christmas dinner.


Steve and Meta are working in the kitchen, Jo is just getting another drink!

Hmm... I'm not entirely sure what I'm doing, given that Meta has basically prepared all the food. While we've been gallivanting around chasing waterfalls (sorry TLC), she's been preparing an array of salads.


As we see.


And trifle for pud.

Hey Meta, I'm impressed. The kitchen facilities here are decent enough, but they're not serious full-on foody-everything, so even quite simple-looking things can turn out to be much more work than you had thought.

We've eaten quite early, so maybe we'll all have a little stroll around the harbour area.


Birds!


Bird on a stick!


It's a restaurant; the ropes are purely cosmetic to link to the boating environment but we like them.


Symbolic Christmas trees? Something like that.


It finally gets dark enough to show off the lights in the trees.

We've always been entertained by the way that the traditional Western European Christmas is translated into cultures and climates that don't match the orignal at all. Tasmania doesn't have short cold days and longer colder nights, but its people have the tradition and seem to be playing it straight.



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