Tassie... oh what a place!

So! I've been back at class for a week but I had a fabulous two week spring break. Although I didn't go anywhere the second week, I had an amazing first week in Tasmania, and was very sick the second week, so it was nice to have an apartment to myself and get lots of sleep. Tasmania Tasmania Tasmania, where to start? I guess I'd never really thought about Tasmania, so there's that, but i mean, what do you think about it? I knew it was in the Australia region, but I didn't think much about it, its not that I thought it wasn't a part of Australia, but never thought it WAS. So, incase you have no idea either, Tasmania is one of the seven states of Australia. Its the only island one, and the smallest. Its just south of Melbourne (a 12 hour ferry ride or a one hour flight). Tasmania kind of reminds me of Maine, but it's an island, so people that live in Tassie can't drive to Boston or New York, nope, they just stay on that litte island of theirs. All of Tasmania has less than 500,000 people, and Hobart (the capital, and where we based our travels out of) has about 200,000 people. Most of the island is national parks and/or wildlife reserves. So. Awesome backpacking destination, but a funny place. Everyone Australian whom i told about my trip would say "tassie? hmm, never been....have fun though! " So we get to Hobart. What a place! We went to the famous (not sure to who, but it is famous) Salamanca Market, which had tons and tons of stalls with crafts and food and used books and on and on. Lots of quality stuff, so I got some gifts taken care of there! We then boarded the bus (that we became VERY friendly with over the week) and headed to Port Arthur (about a 2 1/2 hour drive). We made a few stops to check out beautiful sights such as the 'blowhole' which had some awesome rock formations and huge waves and then the Tasmans Arch and Devils Kitchen which are just huge um, rock cliff things. I don't know what the official name is. So we finally arrive in Port Arthur, which is at the tip of a peninsula that runs parallel to the east coast of Tasmania (and right next to Hobart). We arrive to find out that we are staying on the only lodging ON the convict settlement site. Nice and close! After a surprisingly good dinner at the Comfort Inn restaurant (thats probably what people think after eating at the Senator) and after the sun went down so it was nice and dark, we headed out for our ghost tour. Although I wasn't too impressed with our tour guide (and she was NOT, as Claire pointed out, a hottie with a body, shoot). Anyway, although a bit cheesy once in a while, I was definitely scared. There were way too many stories and accounts of weird happenings for me to not be a little freaked out and scared of seeing something I ddin't want to! After being in way too many dark basements, empty houses, dark jail (gaol as they spell it here) and creepy autopsy rooms, I was pretty ready to be done with the tour. My happiness about having a room to myself quickly changed when I returned to my room...shut the door and realized how creeped out I was! Whew! I slept with the covers pulled up all the way and as tight around me as possible and listened intently for any strange noises...my room had sliding glass doors to a deck that looked out over the convict site...from my room, i could see buildings we had been in, that had very strange things happen in them. SO SCARY!! Anyway, the next day we went for a boat cruise around the bay and we got off and took a tour of the Isle of the Dead, which was the main burial site for over 500 convicts and for many of the higher ups at the penal colony.
We headed out of Port Arthur and were surprised by Liz and Luke (our IES leader people) that they added something to the itinerary! We got to go to a Tasmanian Devil Conservation Center (if you're from Maine...it was a lot like the Gray Animal Farm). So! Super cool place. Tasmanian Devils only exist in Tasmania and they are in really big danger of extinction because a cancer (the only spreadable cancer known) is spreading rapidly through the population and in some places 80% of the population have died already. So yeah, the Center no longer takes in Tassie Devils from the wild (the rest of the animals only come from being injured in the wild) and they are breeding them as much as possible. They have a huge quarantine area and they are trying to build up a population of Tassie Devils to put back in the wild once the disease is under control. Pretty cool, kind of reminded me of the work my Dad did when I was little, I stayed and talked to the woman working there for a while. Anyway, so we got to see the devils get fed, which was crazy. They drop in the meat (bones and all, everything is eaten!) and the devils fought fought fought. They all ripped at it fighting to get it and they were biting so hard and using so much energy to pull that they breathe through their noses. It made this really loud noise and was hilarious. Pretty crazy. We also walked down to the big area where the wallabies and kangaroos are, and got to pet them a little. Almost all of them had joeys either in their pouches or right near them, which was awesome! The joeys were so awkward (their feet are SO huge) and just super cute.
After the Tassie Devil stop we drove for a while, just making one more pitstop. We stopped at Meadowbrook Winery and did a wine tasting. They gave us a reisling (good), chardonnay (good), pinot grigio (okay), cabernet (bad bad bad) and pinot noir (bad), so! Still sure I'm a white wine girl. After the wine they gave us some tasty bread and cheese to go with our wine and we walked around the visitors center which was really nice.
So! Thats the first two days in Tasmania. I'll post more later! Enjoy the pictures and I hope you liked the stories!:)