We drove through Wynyard in the early evening twilight, which in winter in Tasmania, is about six at night.  True, there are other towns in along the coast in Northwestern Tasmania, but this was the end of what we were told was the tourist trail.The beauty of traveling in the off season through Tasmania, and most of the country, is that there are plenty of rooms available.  We had not booked a room for the night, rolling the dice, and hoping that we would be able to find something clean and comfortable, with a few exceptions, most of our travels have gone off without a hitch and we’ve found clean, comfortable accommodations.

Wynyard was no exception.

We did a lap through town, taking in the sights and the culture (and the good looking women) and settled on the Warf Hotel in Wynyard, right across the street from the little fishing fleet moor in the harbor, we walked in to what seemed to be a massive building built for entertaining.  A café to one side, and small, intimate place for drinks and conversation to the other, through the hallway was the family dining room, and around the corner, the town barroom.

An old stairway led upstairs to the rooms beyond.

The cute waitresses directed us towards the proprietor.

“Do you have any rooms for the night?” Melvin asked.

“You mean accommodations?” The man asked.

“Someplace to sleep.” Melvin replied.

“How many beds?” The man asked warily.

Melvin and I looked at each other and shuddered, then said in unison, “Two.”

“I’ll give you three.” The man replied.  Handing us the key and directing us up the stairs.

The hallway was an antique collectors dream.  A large old dresser and wash stand stood silently in the hall, while two opulent chairs leant an air of quiet, if slightly aged, dignity to the place.

Opening the door to the room, sure enough, were three beds, one queen and two twins.  The room was clean, comfortable, if perhaps a bit non-conforming, with beds a bit scattered.  But the view, the view was spectacular in the early twilight, with the last rays of the sun reflecting off of the Tasman Sea out the window.

We made our way back out to the car, intent to check out the meal at the hotel at the opposite end of town.

While the Wharf Hotel in Wynyard advertised the cheapest rooms, the Federal Hotel on the opposite end of town advertized the cheapest meal…with a steak for ten dollars.

The place was packed.  Every table was full or reserved, save one table for two.

“Will this one do?” The happy waitress asked.

“It’ll do fine.  It has too!” We replied.

We were concerned about the ten dollar steak.  Food doesn’t generally come cheap in Australia, a country that prides itself on its fine food, so when the waitress rattled off their list of specials, which included not just a ten dollar steak and ten dollar garlic prawns, we felt, well, skeptical.

As we pondered our menu selections, I went up to the country to try another of Tasmania’s finest, Boag’s Draft.  Boag’s Draught as it is called, is one of my favorite beers in Melbourne, and while I was disappointed that Boag’s Draught at the Federal Hotel was actually out of a bottle, the price ($3.50 each!) and the taste (who thought that little stretch of water called the Bass Straights could impact the taste of beer!) soon had me happy again.

As the waitress came back to take our orders, we quizzed her, still doubtful of the ten dollar steak.

“Does anything come with the steak?” Melvin asked.

“Well, just some sides.” The waitress replied.

In that ‘aha’ Perry Mason type style, Melvin moved in for the kill…sure that the ten dollar steak came with one chip and a couple of kernels of corn.

“And what, may I ask, are the sides?” Melvin asked.

“Broc-co-lie, Potato and a salad.” Came the reply.

The air went out of Melvin’s chest.

“And the ten dollar garlic prawns?”  Melvin asked, still hopeful for an ah-ha moment.

“Rice.  And Salad.” Came the reply.

Drat.  We would just have to enjoy the steak.

We split the garlic prawns for an appetizer (or entre as they call them in Australia) and each got a steak for a main.

And it was good.  It was all very good.

Heading back towards the Wharf Hotel, tired and full from a day of hiking and a very well done meal, we had a another beer in the hotel, then proceeded to sleep and sound sleep on the banks of the Bass Straights.  

 There are transition moments in every young man’s life.  Moments when he knows he is getting older, when the mantle of responsibility comes a little closer to the shoulders.  The moment when one generation starts ceding power to the next.

We all have those moments.

Mine started on a warm June day in northern Minnesota.  Our hay racks, the large flat trailers used to haul hay in from the fields behind one of our trusty tractors were falling apart.  After morning chores, Dad made the announcement over breakfast.

We needed to rebuild those racks.  And we needed lumber to do it.

Not any lumber would do, we would need good, sturdy, Minnesota lumber, two by fours, two by sixes and two by twelve’s, not some fancy planed stuff either, but real, rough lumber from the lumber mills scattered to the east in the forested areas towards Park Rapids.

And the search would start today.

Newly armed with a learners drivers permit, only five months shy of my sixteenth birthday, Dad informed me as we were putting on our best seed caps, I’d be driving part of the way today.

This was a big moment in a young man’s life on our farm.  Dad didn’t cede control of the vehicle easily.  He was the driver - of the farm, of the family, of most things.  I don’t think he liked to turn the keys of the beat up old Ford to anyone.

Climbing in, we set off through town, Dad barking encouragement all the way through town and out onto Highway 200, in between comments on crops, weather, and running through the list of the lumber that we would need.

The defining moment came beyond Roy Lake, approaching Zerkle (a real town), Dad, reviewing the list of lumber turned to me, looked over his glasses and gave me the classic father question, “You’re going a little fast here aren’t you?”

Looking at the speedometer, then out the window, I looked at him and said, “Dad, I’m doing forty-five in a fifty-five mile an hour zone.”

Dad seemed at a bit of a loss for words for a minute, looked at the approaching fifty-five mile an hour sign coming up, leaned over and looked at the speedometer, sat up.  Turned to me, scowled, and said very matter of factly, “Just because the speed limit says you can go that fast, doesn’t mean that you have too.”

You can’t argue with logic like that.

We drove through all the little forest towns between Park Rapids, Bagley, and Bemidji, finally finding the right pieces of lumber at a lumber mill outside of Lake George.  I don’t know if Dad noticed me winking at all of the girls on the side of the road as we passed through Lake George (it was the biggest week of the year with the big town festival that week), but when we stopped for lunch at the little dinner on the edge of town, he took over the wheel again.

The trip was, overall, a great one.  It was a great trip with Dad, learning, talking, and visiting as men do.  Time that, with three older brothers, was often a rare thing.

But me being me, I just couldn’t help myself.

Driving home on Highway 200, I looked over and said, “Going a little fast there aren’t you?”

I swear I saw a smile behind that scowl.

 Hello, and welcome to your new Saturday paper.  If you are already reading this, you can see that my weekly column is still in the same place as it has been since the paper printed its first edition back in August of 1987.  You’ll be reading me here instead of in Wednesday’s paper from now on.

Because I’ve written a column for every Boone TODAY but one that means you’ve been subjected to roughly 200 of them.  Some of them have been fun to write and some of them have been agony.  I imagine that reading them has been a similar experience.

If you are a regular reader, thank you.  I hope that I’ve been able to make you think about some of the issues that we face here in Boone. And I hope I’ve been able to make you smile or brightened your day once in a while.

When I see you around town, many of you stop to comment on a column that I’ve written.  There has been praise and criticism.  I appreciate both, so don’t be shy.

If you’ll keep reading, I’ll keep writing.  And I’ll try to keep improving so that my Saturday columns are better than my Wednesday ones were.

A couple of weeks ago in my column, I related how I spent much time and effort during the last couple of months rounding up Bill Cosby albums for my dad.  I lost the records when I was in junior high and dad never let me forget.  I finally located the records, purchased them at a premium price and gave them to dad for Father’s Day.

Since that column appeared, at least a half dozen people have commented, “If I known you were looking for Cosby albums I would have let you look at mine.  I have a bunch of them in a box that I never listen to anymore.”  I never knew there were so many fans of Cosby’s old comedy routines.

Thanks for the sympathy.  And thanks for your concern.  But where were you a month ago?  After paying top dollar for those albums, I don’t want to know if you have Cosby albums to give away.  In fact, hang onto those old vinyl comedy disks, they may just help you put your kids through college some day.

My parents and my in-laws were both here for visits recently.  We took both sets of parents on trips to the Amana Colonies. My father-in-law, and engineer for the Minnesota Department of Transportation, gave us a running commentary on the road construction going on along the way.  We learned about re-bar, traffic control and paving methods.  It was a very educational trip.

My dad, a farmer, gave us a running commentary on the crops, livestock and farms along the road.  He told us about weed problems, water-stressed crops, overgrazed pastures and beef breeds.  That trip, too, was educational.

But what will happen when I have adult children and we go for a drive?  What will we talk about? What educated things can a writer say about what he sees along the roadside?

“Boy!  The grammar on the billboard is awful!”

 Spotlights traced figure-eights on the clouds.  Highway patrol officers directed the onslaught of traffic.  Slot machines churned 24 hours a day.  Coins jingled.  Tuxedo-clad dealers slid cards across the green felt.

Where did I spend Memorial Day?  Vegas?  Atlantic City?

No.  I found all this activity in the tiny Minnesota farming community where I grew up.  My hometown, Mahnomen, is now the home to the Shooting Star Casino, one of the more than a dozen gambling palaces that Minnesota Indians tribes plan to open.

Iowa’s first Indian casino opened in the western Iowa community of Sloan.  Another is planned for Tama.  Some Iowans argue that casino gambling could bail out Prairie Meadows, Polk County’s failed race track.  Iowa and its Indian tribes should watch what happens in Minnesota.  Will casinos bring their promised economic boom?  Or will problems outweigh any benefits?

Mahnomen is an Ogden-sized community located in northwestern Minnesota’s White Earth Indian Reservation.  Although the town is the county seat and home to the county’s largest school system, it has been shrinking steadily as businesses closed and people moved on.  Then last year, the White -Earth Band of the Chippewa Indian Tribe announced that it would build a Las Vegas-style casino there.

The announcement threw the town into an uproar.  Citizens worried about crime, alcohol abuse, and other problems often associated with gambling.  Every small town craves economic development, but at what cost?

Land values jumped.  Traffic became a concern.  Out-of-town visitors fill bars and restaurants that once held only familiar local faces.  As hotels, restaurants and other new developments were planned, the city clashed with the adjacent township over zoning and annexation issues.  Racial tensions between Indians and non-Indians have never been smooth on the reservation.  So far, the casino has done little to improve them. 

As the casino began hiring employees, local businesses were forced to hike wages to remain competitive.  Would increased wages and development mean more money in the local economy?  Or would they force long-time enterprises out of business?

Some worry that the casino’s success may be short-lived.  The casino must compete with lotteries, riverboat gambling, charitable gambling, horse races, dog races and a host of other casinos.  Can they all succeed?

Last weekend, the $17 million casino and resort held its grand opening.  The giant complex has 850 slot machines, 24 blackjack tables and video keno and poker machines.  The place was packed.  There soon will be two restaurants, hundreds of hotel rooms, an RV park and dinner theater.  Lee Greenwood, Jerry Reed, T. G. Shepard and others are booked to perform at the complex this summer.

In this once-quiet town, the casino has been an unsettling influence.

Will the casino bring a long-term boost to the ailing local economy?  Or will crime and unrestrained development destroy the quiet quality of life that exists there?

It’s too early to tell if this gamble will pay off for the residents of Mahnomen.  But Iowa communities and Indian tribes should study the situation carefully before they wager their own futures on casino gambling.

 Leaving Cradle Mountain, we made our way through the Tasmanian twilight, heading for Wynyard, Tasmania, on the northwestern coast.

We were alone through a desolate stretch of countryside.  It was just us, millions of trees, a slowly descending sun….

And hundreds of wombats and devils coming out to play.

You don’t realize how much you have been trained to holler out the animals of your birth until you see a moving mass on the side of the road and in the time it takes you to think about what it was, it is already a spec in the side view mirror.

More than once, the natural impulse was to shout “DEER!” when it truth it was a wombat.  In the back of your mind, you debate with yourself, not wanting to holler out “WOMBAT!” when it is in fact a “WALLABY!”  Or “TASMANIAN DEVIL!” when it might only be a “LITTLE OPOSSUM!”

So instead, you resort to a casual panic….

“You almost hit that wombat.” I said casually at one point…fingers sunk into the cheap plastic…

“What wombat?” Melvin said

“The one that was just ambling onto the road back there.” I said.

“Oh well, it wouldn’t do much damage if we hit it.” Melvin said.

In my mind, I pictured that wombat (the size of a fully fed hog) and our little Hyundai hitting the same said wombat at ninety kilometers per hour.  I pictured our little Hyundai being airborne for fifty or sixty feet (about fifteen to eighteen meters for those of you keeping track at home).  Our Hyundai fully disintegrated and smeared across the highway…and the wombat, well, I pictured the wombat ambling away with a bit of a headache and complaining about those darn tourists…

For the record, I want to say that I enjoyed the trees.  I enjoyed the hills.  I enjoyed all of God’s creatures when they weren’t dodging out in front of our car.  But I was sure glad to get into civilization.

The trees opened up to a pastoral delight.  Farms and farmsteads sitting resolutely in the evening twilight.  Tractors roaming through the fields, doing the evening chores.  Dairy cows waiting in farmyards for their turn to be milked.

We made our way to Wynyard, happy to be our resting spot for the night, but equally lucky that we had the chance to see the charms of the towns and countryside - from Mole Creek to Cradle Mountain and down to Wynyard.

From the boat house on Dove Lake, we made our way over the trail and past the small Lake Lilla.  While the lake was underwhelming, the stream flowing out of it, over rocky ledges cascading down the steep hilly slope, through a ‘v’ of rock.  That was impressive, and while it was small, it was impressive.The rough trail, moving through mud and brush, with some limited improvements, mainly worn away wooden bridges supplemented by rock paths where the wood had deteriorated to a point beyond use.

The scenery was striking.  The low clouds and fog gave way at times to sights of a mixture of rock, gum tree stands, and open country with tufts of grass and brush.  The kookaburras called through the tree tops, adding a sound of life to the whisper of the wind through the mist and foliage.

Gradually, the path became better and better.  As the trail broke out of the last copse of trees, the trail rose up onto a board walk that meandered over the boggy terrain.  Rivulets of water coursed under the board walk through clumps of grass.  The boggy terrain stretched out for a mile in front of us, cut only by the board walk that we clamored over.

The only hazard now was the gift of the wombat, which clearly thrived over this terrain, enjoying the hillside burrows, the rich, plentiful grass…and using the nicely made boardwalk as a very stylish bathroom.

We didn’t fully understand the bus drivers comment when he said, “Those wombats are our resident brick layers…”

Making our way across the path, the humor struck us all the more.

Over a slight rise, the boardwalk suddenly took a turn downward, as a small river, starting from Dove Lake, now over a mile up the trail, and up the river, cascaded over the boggy terrain, getting bigger from the small streams and rivulets we had crossed.

What was more amazing was that on this seemingly wide, flat, boggy plain, not only did a seemingly ever deepening chasm grow, but that at its shore, at this altitude, lines of palms, stunted by the cold, were not only growing, but thriving.

From the stream, we made our way to Ronny Creek, almost two miles from Dove Lake, and the first of the bus stops.  We had missed our bus by about five minutes, so we were determined rather than wait another twenty-five, we would make the most of our situation and make our way to the next bus stop, about a mile and a half away at Snake Hill.

The boggy plain gave way to a seemingly ever narrowing river valley.  The small river that started out of Dove Lake was now a seemingly ever growing torrent, carving its way through the terrain and falling and rumbling down the gradual mountain slope.

The boardwalk followed the river, with overlooks, stairs, and slopes.  There were some impressive bridges, metal and sturdy, able to withstand the rivers floods, which happen rarely, but when they do, must rip apart the small valley.  The falls and rapids were interspersed with small clearings and glens.

It was along one of these small glens that we first spotted them - the wombats in the wild.

The mother wombat was ambling through the grass, enjoying an afternoon meal.  Her young wombat, still probably suckling age, ambled around her, in front of her, behind her, and even on top of her.  Clearly enjoying the day…and maybe showing off for those two things standing on their bathroom (though the wombat poo was less pronounced on this part of the boardwalk).

Finally making their way beyond a tree and out of sight, we Melvin and I looked at each other and made our way back down the trail.  Happy we had sighted a wombat in the wild.

Leading the pack, I kept an eye out for more wombats on either side of the boardwalk.  Therefore, I was a little surprised to turn a corner and find a wombat ON the boardwalk.

Neither of us seemed to mind, as we both got relatively close to him.  He sniffing the boards (had we interrupted his, uh-hum, biological functions?), we taking pictures until our fingers bled.

We approached him, quietly, whispering to each other (”be careful!” “do wombats attack?” “didn’t the driver call them teddy bears with attitudes?”  ”think he feels trapped?”  ”can he jump that two feet down to the ground?”  ”wonder if his eyesight is like a cows?”)

We were in a bit of a Mexican stand off for a while (I know, we laughed about being in a Mexican standoff with a wombat too…).  Suddenly, the wombat came at us.  We shifted to the right.  He moved to the right.  We shifted to the left.  He shifted back to the left, we shifted to the right.  He looked at us.  I think I could see him roll his eyes at us, and clamored down off the boardwalk.  Looking at us one more time, he zoomed - and I do mean zoomed - off into his burrow under a log about six feet off the trail.

We made our way the rest of the way to the next bus stop, and waited for the bus, fortunate for our close encounters of the wombat kind.

 Bridge Over Stream Coming out of Lake Lilla

 The Small, But Impressive Stream

 Terrain Around the Trail Leading From Dove Lake

 Rough Trail, Great Scenery

 View of Cradle Mountain, From the Trail

 Bridge Over The River

Stream From Dove Lake, Note Palms

 Wombat, Mother Underneath

Excuse Me.  On the Trail of a Wombat…Wait, Wombat On the Trail.

 Amid the ruminating on the wonders of Tasmania, we turned onto the main road leading to Cradle Mountain.  We drove up through the hills and through country that seemed perfect for cattle or sheep, filled with stumps and tufts of grass, with springs running through.  We came to the main entrance of the park, where we bought a stocking hat for myself (it was chilly) and waited for the shuttle bus.

While waiting, we had the classic Australian meal.  Melvin had the meat pie, I had the sausage roll.  Combined with this, we had some potato wedges and coffee…not as good as Melbourne coffee, but not bad, especially on a chilly day.

We climbed onto the bus, well, van actually, and we started our way up to the sight that ranks up there with the Sydney Opera House (according to the Tasmanian Tourist Board) - the sight of Dove Lake in the shadow of Cradle Mountain.

The route to the top is about ten kilometers, it is flanked for most of the way by a trail, well, a board walk actually, with stopping points where the bus will stop and pick you up, or will drop you off.

The driver pointed out the stops as we made our way up the mountainside, curving through valleys and around hillsides.  Calling out the animals as we made our way up the trail - a wombat on that side, wallabies on the other.  There were a few that the driver missed, a wombat calmly watching us from the shade of a gum tree, two wallabies sitting up, under bushes on their butts, like two people hunkered down for a rest or a game of cards (I could just imagine them playing poker together, under the shade of the trees).

Finally making it to the top, we registered as hikers in the log book, and made our way through the light rain and drizzle out into a sight…that closely rivals that of the Sydney Opera House.

Even in the rain, Cradle Mountain and Dove Lake are stunning.  Walking up to the lake, there is a large rock on one side (aka Glacial Rock) and on the other side is an old boat house (aka The Boat House) from some long ago holiday get away.

In the rain, we made our way to Glacial Rock.  Climbing up the rock, the view down into the water, and out across the lake to the mountains beyond, in the soft misty fog was ethereal, with top of Cradle Mountain making its way in and out of the haze.

Walking to the other side of the lake, to the Boat House, a rainbow appeared, one end anchored at Glacial Rock, the other at the Boat House.  It was mystical.

The Boat House, though old, was still in good shape.  Aside from the trail (and the board walk), little else remained that would show that this little cove in this little lake had held humans before.  It was like a quiet little piece of another world, surrounded by quiet waters, mist, and stunted gum trees of the mountains.

 View of the approach to Cradle Mountain

 Dove Lake, with Cradle Mountain in the Background

 View Looking Down From Glacial Rock

 Boat House, With Rainbow

 Another View of the Boat House

View From Inside the Boat House

 Slowly, we twisted our way along the serpentine roads until we reached the corner for Cradle Mountain.

I will admit, leading up to the trip, and even as we made our way along the roads to Cradle Mountain, a silly thought kept on coming into my head.

For those of you that are fans of the old 1980’s television show, “Cheers,” you will remember coach, the character that was the barkeeper for Sam Malone.  On the show, coach was a bit, for lack of a better term, slow witted.  He could turn a phrase or insert a one liner that would have us rolling around laughing.

What does this have to do with Tasmania?

On one of the episodes, he was trying to help Sam Malone (the bar owner) prepare for his GDE.  To this end, he tried to convince Sam to learn the countries of the world by singing about them.  The one that he sang…

(To the tune of ‘When the Saints Go Marching In):

“Albania!  Albania! You border on the Adriatic. Your land is mostly mountainous.  And your chief export is chrome.”

I’m sorry…but in my mind, it was so easy to change it too:

“Tasmania!  Tasmania!  You border on the Tasman Sea.  Your land is mostly mountainous.  And your chief export is wool.”

Which, when you think of it, sums up Tasmania pretty darn well.

The Tasman Sea

Mountains

Wool

 Traveling in our rented Hyundai through the less then populated areas of Tasmania, with only a GPS and a less then reliable map out of the back of a tourist guide, soon had us questioning the directions.

We were even less sure of ourselves when the first tourist stop that we came to was the “Famous Honey Farm” which billed itself as having over fifty types of honey and a plethora of things made out of honey.

It was closed.  On a Saturday. We felt a bit uneasy about our trip.  This was, after all, winter in Tasmania.  And it was a cool eight degrees Celsius (about forty-five Fahrenheit).

We made our way to the next town, the metropolis of Mole Creek, where we stopped at the Mole Creek Information Center.

“G’day, can I help you gentlemen?” Came the voice of the information attendant

“Yes please.  We are just looking at what we can do in this area.  See if you have any maps.” Melvin said.

“Right.  Well plenty to do.  There is a great honey farm right up the road.  Can you believe they have fifty types of honey?” Replied the attendant.

“We just drove past.  They looked closed.” Melvin replied.

“Oh right.  Seventh Day Adventists. It’s Saturday.  Pity.  Fifty types of honey.” The attendant said mournfully.

“Anything else to do?” Melvin said as we glanced at the brochures.

“Oh plenty!” The attendant said with renewed enthusiasm.  “There is a cheese factory up near Latrobe.  And a chocolate factory too.  Have you thought about Seahorse world?  It is splendid.  There is the store in Latrobe.  The Reliquirum.  It.  Is.  Amazing.  I’ve never seen anything like it, and let me tell you - I’ve seen some things in my life.  There is stuff everywhere.  Then there is honey world.  Shame that it’s closed.  They are Seventh Day Adventists.  Pity.  Fifty types of honey….”

“OK,” Melvin replied, “What about Cradle Mountain, how far are we from Cradle Mountain?”

“Cradle Mountain…Well, it’s way around here” The attendant said, pointing to the map, “You need to come all the way up and around here, you don’t want to take these roads” he said, gesturing towards the roads leading to Cradle Mountain, “They are just…well…they curve.  They are like something off a driving commercial.  You can go up here and see the Mole Creek Caves.  Or up to see King Solomon Caves, or you could go over to see Queenstown.  But really, it is a drive.  And all there is are trees.  Trees and rocks.”

“Trees and rocks?” Melvin repeated.

“Yeah, I mean, trees and rocks.” Said the attendant, “I’ve never been over there, but I’ve been to Launceston, and Latrobe, and pretty much everywhere in between.  And down to Hobart.  There are some good things to see.  You saw the honey place driving in?”

“Yes, we saw the honey place.”  Melvin replied.  “Do you have a map?” 

“Nope, no maps.  They sell them though.  Not here.” Said the attendant.

“Well, we have a GPS, but it would be nice to get a map.” Melvin said.

“A GPS!  A GPS! Why that won’t be very useful up here!  Likely to take you right into a tree.  I’ve been on Google Earth and you can’t even get a good close up of most of this country!  A GPS!  Ha!” The attendant, clearly entertained and less than enthusiastic about the use of technology.

Retreating to our car, after a lesson in GM Trees and the conspiracy of the logging companies to cover up a massive oyster kill (it was on the ABC!), we made our way to the gas station where a very helpful lady silently sold us a map.

I will admit, it may sound like I’m mocking Mole Creek.  But far from it.  Driving through, it was a charming little town.  With a school and homes that people clearly took pride in.  It a lot of ways, it reminded me of a lot of little towns back where I’m from…well, maybe without the honey place up the road…did you hear it was closed on Saturdays?

Leaving Mole Creek, we made our way through the twisting turns of the roads in between.  The attendant wasn’t kidding about these roads possibilities in car commercials.  There were some wicked turns and some good sized hills.

Hyundai would not film a commercial on these roads.

The sights were truly amazing.  Six foot ferns (in height).  Massive trees.  Dark, red soil. Huge cliffs.  Deep ravines.

These wouldn’t be considered mountains, but they could be.

 ”What are you doing this weekend?” One of my co-workers inquired over beverages after work on Friday.

“Flying to Tasmania tomorrow morning.  Launceston.” I replied.

“Tasmania!  Northern Tasmania?” He said with a bit of surprise. “Filled with lumberjacks and women!”

“And I’ve heard it is hard to tell the difference.” I replied with mock seriousness.

Tasmania has a bit of a, well, a reputation in mainland Australia, as being, well, a bit different.

“Look for the scar on their shoulders.”  Someone else offered, “A lot of them have scars from where the second head was cut off.” 

“You might find a girl down there.” Came another reply. “They are looking to expand the blood lines.”

Is it any wonder that everyone thought that my remark about going to Incenton (rhymes with Launceston) was so darn funny.

Getting on the plane Saturday morning (an 80 $au flight from Melbourne to Launceston) these were the thoughts that ran though my mind.

Well, that and the large percentage of extremely well dressed and good looking women getting on the flight.

It could be a very good trip.

At any rate, the trip was short (less than an hour from gate to gate) and uneventful.  The sky was cloudy, but opened up to sunshine the minute that we hit the tarmac.  The sunshine seemed to say, “Welcome to Tasmania…now don’t you feel guilty for all of those jokes you told about this place.”

Nah.  Not really, a place like this has to like the reputation, just to keep the riff-raff away.

I was traveling with Melvin, the other American in the office.  As mentioned before, Melvin is a top notch traveler, great story teller, and shares a great deal of common interests - farming, outdoors, and admiring women.

After working our way through the airport and the rental counter, we made our way towards our Hyundai.  The car was adequate for what we needed - small, but ample leg room.  With two big guys inside, it probably seemed a bit like a clown car, but it sufficed.

We made our way out of the Launceston (rhymes with Inceston) airport, through the village of Perth (Tasmania…not the capital of Western Australia), and headed towards Cradle Mountain, one of the most iconic natural sights in Australia.

Or so the Tasmania Tourism board would have us believe.

One way or another, we were on our way.