First Meal in The Philippines
A trip to the Philippines was always on the horizon for us with A having lived there a few years during his childhood, and he was keen to revisit. 2025 granted us an easy way to take a block of leave with the Easter public holidays and ANZAC day appearing close together, so it was a bit of a no brainer. It was also whale shark season (more on that later). And it was my birthday again, so time for a trip!
This is a placholder post, possibly to give myself some accountability.
In 2023, we visited South Korea for the first time.
Continue reading to see an itinerary of where we went.
This is a placholder post, possibly to give myself some accountability.
In 2023, we visited Japan, the first time in 10 years for me and 6 years for A.
Continue reading to see an itinerary of where we went.
kunanyi As Seen From Rosny Hill Lookout
It was starting to feel like we had allocated too many days to Hobart and we felt quite constrained without having a car. Today was market day but found there wasn’t much else we could tackle without a car, so the logical thing to do was to hire a car again, just for the day.
Cunts... and other conversations by Greg Taylor.
Yes, it happens. Today was dedicated to visiting the Museum of Old and New Art (MONA). This is an art museum privately funded by a rich dude which subsequently boosted tourism immensely in Tasmania. So, expectations were sky high.
Later, we have a subpar evening in Hobart.
River Derwent and Sandy Bay as seen from Castray Box at Sunset
Today was our first full day in Hobart. It was a really relaxing day where we aimed to soak up some history and art and seek out good food.
Ross Bridge, Constructed in 1836
We had a tightly planned day but the aim was to drive from Barrington to Hobart, which would take roughly 4 hours. We had some extra stops to make because I reworked the things we had to drop on Day 3 into today’s plan. Today is also the last day we have the car. Once again, just because you planned it doesn’t mean things go to plan.
Man vs. Kangaroo
Today was earmarked as a buffer day in case we were not able to do Cradle Mountain the day before. Of course we know that turned out just fine, so we spent the day doing some things on the backup plan like seeing some Tassie Devils and doing laundry at Devonport. From now to the end of the trip, there will be no more hiking and things will be more laidback (and not as exciting to be honest).
Cradle Mountain as seen from Marions Lookout
Cradle Mountain was the second big headliner of our trip in Tassie. We were pretty pumped for it and determined not to screw it up. Turns out we were extremely lucky to see Cradle Mountain on such a clear day - apparently there are 30 such days in the entire year.
Sunset over a private reservoir in Barrington, Tasmania
Today was intentionally a breezy relaxing day where we would just pop in to various places on the North Western Tasting Trail and have a look see or scoff food down our gobs. The only thing we had to do was make our way west towards Cradle Mountain. We had booked accommodation at a repurposed church in Barrington, which was about an hour away from Cradle Mountain. We were going to just commute to the mountain the next day because any type of accommodation closer to the mountain was very exhorbitant.