This morning we got up bright and early and started our day with a delicious cup of instant coffee. We then caught a plane to Hobart Tasmania. We landed in Tasmania around 1pm and picked up our rental car. Some ridiculously small, manual, European thing that makes us laugh. We feel like we should be in a comedy routine. We headed out to Wrest Point Resort and Casino which is where we are staying our first night. We aren't really interested in the casino part of the hotel, although this place actually has tables not just pokies. We picked Wrest point because it is on the river and has a marina next door so Eric can look at the boats.

We checked in just as the Sri Lankan Cricket team was checking out. Eric and I watched the match yesterday on tv and noted that they were playing in Hobart. They are in a tri-tournament right now with Australia and India so we have seen them play quite a bit in the month that we have been in Australia. Last night Sri Lanka took a tough loss and may have illuminated themselves from the finals. Anyway it was cool to see them in person and the guys that work at the hotel were impressed that we knew anything at all about Cricket.

On the way to the hotel Eric and I stopped at a bottle shop and picked up a bottle of Champagne. We found a bottle of Preece C******nay/Pinot Noir Sparkling. I went to High School with a guy named Andrew Preece and he recommended that we look for a bottle of his relatives wine. It was really good. We sat in our room and enjoyed our view of the river and watched the sailboats go by. Nice recommendation Ange!

We ventured out into Hobart for an evening of walking around and seeing the sights. Hobart was settled in 1804, making it Australia’s second oldest city and most southernmost capitol. In the 1820’s Britain’s jails were overflowing, so they chained together tens of thousands of convicts, put them on ships and sent them to Tasmania. By the 1850’s half of the population of Tassie were convicts. The jails were overcrowded so the prisoners who were in for lesser crimes and who behaved were able to get out of jail and work their way to freedom and then become business owners and landholders. Rumors of this got back to Britain and so people began committing crimes just to be exiled to Tasmania.

We ended up walking a few miles to an artsy section called Salamanca Place. This is the sight of the old jails. It is several buildings that have been redone and is now an arts Center. The square was full of galleries, restaurants and shops. Our first stop was a fish market and restaurant. We were told when in Tassie we must eat a scallop pie so we did. I think we need to try a better scallop pie. This one was a little dry and flavorless. We are going to find a good bakery and try again. We moved on to a cool sidewalk café and had wine and a local cheese and fruit platter. We decided to catch a cab back to our hotel because we were miles away and it is cold down south. Wrest Point has a revolving restaurant so we went there for a little Grand Marnier and gourmet nut mix and sat for a while watching the city lights of Hobart go by.