Yep…It’s a little late. We’ve now been back home for the same amount of time that we were travelling around Oz. Nine Months!  The list of excuses is pretty long as to why I haven’t got around to updating everyone on the last leg of our adventures.  Life has been busy.  We’ve been busy adjusting to life as it is now.  But mostly I really couldn’t bear to look at our pictures because we really didn’t want it to end…ever!

Our final leg of our journey involved one month in Tassie and a very quick month seeing a little of Victoria and South Australia before heading home.  So in the interests of finishing what I started… enjoy!

Tassie

We loved it.  The scenery was breathtaking, the history was fascinating and the food was DELICIOUS!!!

We headed down to Hobart straight off the overnight ferry, early in the morning. The beautiful old town of Richmond was our base for a few days while we visited Hobart and Mt Wellington.  We also did a day trip down to Southport, the most Southerly point on Mainland Tassie.

 

We then jumped on another ferry and headed to Bruny Island.  This was one of our favourite parts of Tassie.  We did an Adventure Sea Tour which took us on a jet boat out to the sea cliffs of Bruny Island.  We also  got to venture into the Southern Ocean briefly, as it was such a lovely calm day.

 

While in Bruny Island we camped at ‘The Neck’ a fantastic little campground right on a beautiful beach, where you can watch penguins come back to their nests at dusk.  We visited the lighthouse and ate oysters, cheese and drank wine.  It was pretty much heaven!

 

Once back on the Tassie mainland, we headed East to Carlton where we stayed at Eldee Camp Spot.  Another fantastic camp site with great facilities and extra friendly hosts (thanks Lou and Mick!)  Here the weather turned nasty so we spent a lovely day by the fire in the camp kitchen cooking, chatting to other campers and watching the cricket out of the elements.  The next day we headed down to Port Arthur for history class!

Next we headed North to Coles Bay for a couple of days where we explored the Freycinet Peninsula and hiked up to the Wineglass Bay lookout.

Then it was on to St Helens for a few days to explore the Bay of Fires.

From here we headed back West to Launceston, through The Great Lakes District and on to Strahan on The East Coast of Tassie.  The kids had a great time at the Tree Top Adventure Park just out of Launceston.

 

In Strahan we went on the Gordon River Cruise, including a guided tour of the infamous Sarah Island, an had an amazing day.

Our final leg of Tassie took us up through Cradle Mountain, Somerset and then finally Stanley where we had booked ourselves a beautiful little cottage for three nights to celebrate Christmas.

I have to admit we didn’t see nearly as much as we should have in Stanley.  We were so happy to be inside a house after eight months in the trailer that we couldn’t bring ourselves to leave!  We cooked ourselves a big Chrissy feast, taking advantage of the amazing Tassie food, and made the most of it.

A month later and a couple of days before New Years Eve we sadly waved goodbye to Tassie.

Melbourne and Victoria

We had mixed feelings heading to Melbourne. We were excited about seeing a new city but it also meant we were getting closer to the end of our trip.  But we made our way off the boat and through the city to the caravan park, where we found our teeny, tiny strip of grass to park on for the next three days.  In the end we had a great time.  Lily and I spent a day window shopping while the boys went to the third day of the Boxing Day Test.  We spent some time looking around at the Christmas Window Displays on Bourke Street and at the Crown.  We also went to watch the Perth Scorchers play ( and beat!) the Melbourne Renegades at the Big Bash!  So much fun!

 

After our quick Melbourne visit it was time to head South for New Years Eve.  This was spent in Colac with our Cousins on their property and we had a great time catching up with everyone.  We even squeezed in a cold and windy day at the country races! We were so well looked after it was a bit hard to leave!

However, with South Australia in our sights we headed off with a quick stop at the Twelve (ish) Apostles along our way to Mt Gambier for the night.

 

South Australia

We spent our first night in SA in Mt Gambier, just over the border.  We made sure to visit the Blue Lake, which was very blue and pretty amazing really.

Next we headed along towards Adelaide following the Coorong.  We ended up in a little town called Meningie and scored a fantastic campsite right out the front of Lake Albert, with not a mosquito in site! Bonus!

Any other time we would have stayed longer, but time was running short, so instead we headed to the Barossa Valley for a few days via Adelaide City and with a quick stop to catch up with some friends we met at Mt Bundy Station in the NT.  We spent a few lovely days in the Barossa relaxing and wine tasting.

 

From the Barossa we planned to spend our last few days exploring the Eyre Peninsula.  We spent the first night in Cowell on the Eastern side.  From there we headed South to Port Lincoln and Coffin Bay for a quick look before finally arriving in Venus Bay.

We had hoped to spend a few days by the beach in the sun before heading back to WA, but the weather didn’t want to follow our plans and after the rain started to set in, we decided it was finally time to head for home.  So, with the most extreme case of mixed feelings ever, we headed West.  From there it was a stop overnight at Cocklebiddy and another day straight through to Bunbury to see the family.

 

We had just had what will probably always be remembered as the best nine months of our lives.  While we were sad that it was over, we had absolutely no regrets.

Now to start planning the next trip!