Day 158 – Launceston

Some mornings I wish I had a thermometer to measure the temperature inside/outside the van (though, the temperature of the engine head was 02C…) It was a clear night with a nearly full moon, and while it wasn’t warm before the sun set, it rapidly dropped once darkness came. This morning we woke inside the clouds, which was something different – fortunately the grove that we’d camped in provided some respite from the wind.

It wasn’t far from Ralph Falls to Launceston, but due to all the mountain roads, we didn’t get there until midday. First call was visiting the Mitsubishi dealer to pick up the replacement t-piece… only to find that I’d unluckily managed to order the wrong one… There are three t-pieces in the heater circuit, two are the same, (which I ordered) the other is different (the difference is the size of the T outlet, the one I ordered has a 12 or 13mm outlet, I needed one with a 10mm…). Never mind, I’m sure it’ll come in handy, and it was only $15. The correct one was ordered in to one of the Melbourne dealers. I’m still amazed that I can order these random pieces directly from Mitsubishi, considering it’s a car that was never sold here.

Next was the Boags Brewery. They have tours at 11AM and 3PM which cost $30 and include beer/cheese tastings. I’m interested in the brewery, but more interested in sampling the different beers. Sadly they don’t offer a platter of brews to sample, but they do sell quite cheap glasses to sample (7oz ~ 200mL) for $3.50. We grabbed two of the beers that are only available in Tasmania, the XXX Ale (which is actually a lager) and the Wizard Smiths. The XXX was really fragrant and tasty and too easy to drink. We were advised that the Wizard Smiths was like a British Ale, and is best left to warm a little to really taste the sweetness, so I sacrificed the warmth of my hands to induce a little heat into it. It had a fabulous smell to it, and a very rich taste too – much richer/darker/fuller than the XXX. I don’t know if I could pick a favourite between Boags and Cascade, especially with such a gap between tastings. Tasmanians are lucky to have two high quality local beers.

There was a free museum upstairs of their ‘Centre For Beer Lovers’ (pub/souvenir shop). In it they talked about the history from inception, through innovation, inheritance and upheavals into what it is today. Also lots of artwork/advertising/cans/bottles from the past. The buildings themselves were interesting to look at from outside, too (as was Cascade).

Sadly, by the time we’d done some shopping and taken care of some business (flights in Japan, changing ferry dates back to Melbourne etc) it was already after 3PM. I wanted to have a quick visit to the QVMAG (Queen Victoria Modern Art Gallery) to see some of their photographic exhibitions, but by the time we managed to get there with all the one-way streets and overpasses/tunnels/freeways (and me paying for someone else’s parking meter because I didn’t realise you had to choose the bay before you inserted money…) it was 3:30PM… and it sadly shut at 4PM. There was two fantastic exhibitions that we sadly had to rush through just to be able to see it all – Wildlife Photographer of the Year (2012) and Into The Wild. WPotY is pretty self-explanatory I hope – lots of wildlife themed photographs based on different categories, like endangered, underwater, interaction with man etc. As always with these exhibitions, it was truly humbling seeing such amazing images, especially the ones in the junior category (it starts from 10 years…). The other exhibition that we (just) managed to see was Into The Wild ­– which was all about photography of the Tasmania wilderness. We’ve now been to some of these places and seen some of these sights (from some of the same vantage points, too), but these photos just made it look even better than I remember it. It also painfully rubbed in all the places that we were unable to see due to the weather being uncooperative while we were there… But, I’m sure they had more time/patience than we did.

We know that we’d barely scratched the surface of Launceston, but we did enjoy the little drive around some of the old ‘inner city’ streets.

Luckily with daylight savings time, we still had quite a bit of time before darkness set in so we headed back in to the mountains to see Liffey Falls. Like most tourists, we were caught out with how far something is on a map, compared to how long it takes to get there! The roads were steep and tight, and at some points we were down to 20kph and just crawling up the muddy road (I still don’t want to push the engine too hard until I can put the genuine t-piece back into the cooling system). It was an easy 1km walk to the falls, and along the way there were a few moderate cascades. It wasn’t the size that made them interesting, but rather the sheerness of them – everything was right-angles/cubic. It really looked like it was man-made.

The actual falls weren’t particularly high, but they were very wide and uniform. It felt like an incredibly long way to come (it wasn’t in reality, we just took a shortcut) and I wasn’t disappointed. I wanted a better angle to see the falls, so I crept out in to the middle. Apart from my feet burning from the cold water, I was standing on flat rock that had been covered in algae all the while being pushed by a considerable force of water. I wanted to spend longer walking around finding a better angle, but after this one shot I was happy that I hadn’t fallen in (walking out was even a challenge, so I’m quite happy I didn’t fall in with the camera…).

We’re a little surprised at how quickly the day disappeared, and it still feels like we didn’t really do much. Oh well…

１５  8日目　　１０月　１8日（金 ）

今日は、移動が多かったせいかあっという間に1日かすぎました。

移動距離は長くなかったのですが、かなり急で道幅の狭いメジャーではない峠をいくつかゆっくり慎重に越えたので、タスマニアで2番目に大きなローンセストンという街に着いたのは、お昼。

ジェームスバーグというオーストラリアのバーや酒屋ではほぼどこでも置いている位メジャーなビール工場で試飲とミュージアムに行ってきました。

ツアーは、１１時からと３時からのみで、ちょうど逃してしまったので、試飲とミュージアムのみ。
いつものような小さなグラスで試飲するセットはなかったので、2種類のビールを試飲。

どちらも程よい甘みと苦みは感じるものも、スッキリとかなり飲みやすい味で、美味しくいただきました。　　ランチをまだ食べていなく、空腹だったせいもあってちょっとほろ酔い笑

そんなほろ酔いの中上のミュージアムを見てきました。　初代ジェームス　バーグさんがイギリスから移住し、ここにビール工場を建てた会社の成り立ちや、昔の広告、現代の広告、歴代のビンや缶のパッケージなども展示されていました。
広告は、戦争、オリンピック、経済の発展などなど、社会情景に合わせたもので、とても興味深かったです。

ビールの味も時代によって流行、好まれる味が変化するので、昔から変わらないものもあれば、数年も絶たずに廃盤になったものなど色々あるそうです。

買い出しをすませ、ランチを食べるとあっという間に３時。

街の美術館で、野生動物を題材にした写真の特別展示が開催されていて面白そうだったので見てきましたが、４時に閉館だったので、残念ながら３０分しか展示を見る事ができなかったのが残念。。

それにしても、息をのむ様な決定的瞬間や、かわいらしい動物達、肉に食らいつくいかにも動物的なもの、、様々なタイプの写真がありましたがどれも、素晴しかったです。

その後は、Liffey Fallという滝へ向かいました。　　この滝もかなりの急な峠を登ったり、下りたり、、、、

駐車場からは、３０分ほどのちょっと急な下り。　行きを楽して、これを後で登るのがいやだなぁ、、、笑　でも冷帯雨林の緑の濃い森が、ジュラシックパークのようで結構ステキです。

滝の落差はさほどなく迫力はないですが、人口的に切られた様なとってもストレートな岩盤が何段かになっていて、柔らかい感じの階段状の滝でした。

今日は、ここでキャンプをする事にしました。

タスマニア周遊は、思ったより少し時間が短く済んだので、追加料金は＄１５０程かかりましたが、日曜日にフィリップ島で行われるモートGPというバイクのレースを見に行く為にフェリーの予約を火曜日から明日土曜日の夜に変更しました！！

去年は、ブリスベンから飛行機でメルボルンへ行き、レンタカーを借りて観戦したモートGP、今年は、お金も時間も多分間に合わないから残念ながら諦めていたので、最高に楽しみです！！！

去年は、すでに真夏日なブリスベンからの参加で寒さに凍えていたけど、今回は、このタスマニアで少しは鍛えられたので、寒さ対策は多分万全なはず笑

明日は、タスマニア最後の日。　結局今日も時折雨が降ったので、これでタスマニア滞在中雨が降らなかった日は、なんとゼロ笑

明日は、終日晴れの予報だけど、どうなんでしょう〜