Exams Loom Ahead

School's out and we're in our ridiculous three-week-long exams period. No one understands why it takes three weeks and it seems to be unanimously hated. I've got three free weeks before I have any tests, so I've been exploring the community a bit more. Last week I kept hearing about "The Royal Hobart Show". It was all over the radio -- live broadcasts from the show and advertisements for it after every song. They even made a pubic holiday for it, shutting down the Post and banks. I didn't have a clue what it was, but I went to it.


Turns out it's just a fair/livestock show..a rather small one at that. The Iowa State Fair and Mississippi Valley Fair are both substantially bigger than Hobart Show. The weather was particularly gloomy the day that I went, so I decided to make my photos reflect that. I almost always shoot color so I thought I'd switch it up a bit this time.

Downtown near the bus station:


Out the window on my 40 minute bus ride to Glenorchy:


Mt Wellington, which actually got a good bit of snow last week:


Onto the fair show. I had to check out the pig races:


There were only handful of rides, and none of them were very crowded.


..and the Australian Defence Force let children play with assault rifles :D






Saturday I spent some time at the Salamanca Market, which is quite famous and is one of Hobart's biggest attractions. It's basically a huge flea market/farmer's market and you can get really anything you want there.

The performers can be really interesting. Heidi Limebeer was singing on Saturday. She's an extraordinary singer from Sydney. Check out her myspace page and listen to her songs: Click me!


Here's a typical booth in the market. I'll be going back this week and getting some more delicious Bruny Island fudge.



Yesterday I went for a hike up and over Mt. Nelson, which I live at the base of. It took about an hour and a half to get to the top moving at a pretty aggressive pace, then about 2-3 hours to hike down the backside and walk back around the base via the Derwent River Highway.

This was a typical view going up, lots and lots of eucalyptus trees.




Here's a view from near the top, looking west at Hobart.


..and here's a closer crop of that same shot for detail. The building that's kinda hidden in the edge of the treeline is the Wrest Point Casino hotel, which is just 3 blocks from my house


I stopped at the top, got a sarsaparilla, and headed down. The hike down was much more enjoyable. It was less of a cut path and more walking though the woods, like shown here:


I decided just to walk home from the bottom instead of bussing. It was about 2 hours on the highway right along the coast. Tons of awesome houses for sale.


..and here's me from last night, trying to improvise some lighting out of boredom:


Hope you enjoyed!