Australia - Tasmania

Tasmanian Devil Conservation Park

The Warner Bros character Taz is part of our childhood memories so we were thrilled to meet real Tasmanian devils!! And surprisingly they are really cute little animals, smaller than a dog. Their unfair name ("devil") probably comes from their cry. But they are relatively harmless animals: not very agile, bad runners and jumpers. Only their jaws are very powerful. This carnivorous marsupial ends up eating mostly animals already dead or injured or stupid enough to get caught.

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Tasmania is an heart-shaped island located southeast of Australia. The weather is more temperate than the rest of Australia, creating a very diverse and rich environment. About one third of Tasmania is protected as National Park and one fifth is world heritage listed. A large part of the territory is also cultivated or used as pasture for numerous cows and the famous merinos sheeps! Few towns punctuate the territory but the island is not very populated with only 500.000 inhabitans for 68.000km² (more or less the size of Ireland). This wonderful situation makes Tasmania one of the place on earth with the cleanest air.

Lake Pedder

Pirates Bay

The best way to visit the island is of course by car, to admire the variety of vistas and make a lot of pictures stop. In fact it is the first time it has been so challenging to choose less than twenty pictures between the four hundred we took during our six days in Tasmania! Landscapes alternate from moutains to huge lake, bucolic hilly countryside, cliff and sandbeach coast or rainforests with very high trees. Some of them are up to 10.000 years old. 

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Richmond was once the most populated area of Tasmania, filled with farmers and convicts coming from Britain, at the time when Tasmania was still called Van Diemen's Land after the Dutch governor of the East Indies. The houses have been well preserved and the surrounding environment seems intact. This creates a really lovely historic village:

Richmond bridge (oldest bridge in Australia) built in 1823 and

St John Church (Australia's oldest existing Catholic church) built in 1826

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The astonishing view of Hobart from Mont Wellington

Hobart is the second oldest city of Australia, located some ten kilometres from where the British settlers originally punged their anchor on the island. It is now the biggest city and harbour of Tasmania and the capital of the state. The city centre appears provincial, quiet and picturesque with still some buildings built by convicts. Salamanca market every Saturday morning is a local institution to taste food specialties and admire the craft skills of this territory.

Sullivans Cove

Salamanca Market

Salamanca Market

We couchsurfed for three nights in Hobart and happened to learn some local colorful expressions. For example "park a tiger" means "to throw up" or "full as the last bus home" means "very drunk".

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A new museum was opened in January 2011, a few kilometres north from Hobart. The ride in ferry from Hobart habour to the museum is really idyllic! The Museum of New and Ancient Art (MONA) hosts David Walsh's private collection of ancient, modern and contemporary art. Both its creator and some works exposed are very controversial. The poop machine (Cloaca professional by Wim Delvoye) for instance has been much commented. Modernity is a key word there. For example there are no titles under the pieces but you visit the museum holding an iPod which displays information about the works near you.

  Cloaca professional

Us playing with an interactive screen

Australia - Canberra/Surfers Paradise

 

Australian coat of arms

Canberra was created from scratch to put an end to the rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne. In 1908 Canberra was chosen as the site for the national capital. The international competition launched to design this capital was won by the American architect Walter Burley Griffin in 1912.

Thought as a city of the future, it became more a surreal place like no other in the world. In fact each time we mentionned to Australians that we were going to visit this city, every one of them was asking immediatly "WHY??".

The plans conceived by Burley Griffin are very geometric. For example a triangle is formed between the Parliament House, the Defence Head Quarters and the City Hill. And an amazing perspective is created between the War Memorial and the Parliament House. Other axis determine the shape of the city.

Urban map, National Capital Exhibition

View from the Australian War Museum on the ANZAC Parade Memorials and the old and new Parliament Houses

To create a unique environment, thousands of trees and shrubs were planted. The buildings in the city as in the suburbs are very spaced and the car is king to circulate in the huge avenues.

All of Burley Griffin's plans are still not executed nowadays. And the huge lake he had foreseen in the middle of the city was realised only in the 1960's.

Captain Cook Memorial Water Jet in Burley Griffin Lake

The original plan allocated precise functions for each part of the city: the ministries area, the embassies area, the city centre, the university district, etc. This artificial organization created an impersonal city that looks empty all the time, weekends and weekdays.

Administrative city, Canberra is also a museum city with the most important Art and History collections of the country. One can visit the National Museum of Australia, the National Capital Exhibition, the National Portrait Gallery, the National Gallery of Australia, the Museum of Australian Democracy (in the old parliament houses), etc. for free.

We were quite surprised by the freedom we felt walking around the current Parliament House. And security officers were so welcoming and friendly with us. We were even able to attend a session of a senatorial commission without anyone asking us our identity. We were in a room with seven Australian Senators and the president of the commission even came to us in the audience seating zone to tell we were "very welcome" before going back to his chair! Incredible!

Museum of Australian Democracy at Old Parliament House

Senate in the Old Parliament House

Senate in the Parliament House

 Some memorials were also anticipated like the National Police Memorial. The most important of them is the Australian War Memorial hosted in a beautiful building which presents Australian participation in numerous international conflicts since the First World War.

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Surfers Paradise (yes, it is the name of a real city) is a really different destination. Located along the Gold Coast, Surfers Paradise is one of Australian's favourite holidays spot and playground. During winter it looks more like a city for retired people.

This area is famous for surfing (of course), swimming, diving and other seaside activities. A lot of people are also attracted by the many theme parks, other entertainment facilities and adventure tours.

So we took advantage of it to visit the world's largest collection of Australian native animals: Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary. The first contact with kangaroos and koalas was something important for us! ;) We were lucky to see a lot of koalas awaken as they are known for sleeping most of the time. The kangaroos enclosure was open to visitors so we were able to walk in a field with dozens of kangaroos wandering around, laying down sunbathing or coming for a contact with human beings in hope for some food.. We also discovered a lot of species we had never heard about before.

Lorikeets

Australia - Sydney

View from a ferry in Sydney Harbour

Sydney is the main Australian city where disembarked and settled the first British fleet on the island in 1788. Britain created and developed this new colony after the loss of its North American empire. During the first six decades, the British sent more than 160 thousands convicts to their different settlements in Australia and Tasmania. Having more freedom and opportunities in this new world in construction, many convicts decided to stay once their sentence served. 

Hyde Park Barracks was designed as a secure night lodging building for 600 men and boys but hosted sometimes more than 1.300 convicts! The building had then other functions and in 1979 became a museum recreating convict lives at the beginning of the colonization.

Hyde Park Barracks Museum

Dormitory

This museum, like Susannah Place Museum, belongs to the Historic Houses Trust and shows the interest that Australians pay to their own History.

Susannah Place Museum is located in one of the oldest district of Sydney called the Rocks. This area was threatened to be bulldoze in the 1970's because of insalubrity. But this urban heritage was saved by a green ban after many demonstrations of the residents. Susannah Place is a rare surviving example of a popular four houses block built in bricks. Visiting this historic home we felt like in a granny's house with the toilets in the courtyard..

British influence is clearly visible in Australia. In the common culture, the language, the architecture, etc. Looking at the cathedrals.. we could think we are in London! Also these new inhabitants of the island were not very original and most of the streets, parks and districts have their English counterparts for example New South Wales, Liverpool, Hyde Park.

St Marys Cathedral

St Andrews Cathedral

Magazine found in St Andrews Cathedral,

an example of the very Aussie habit to finish every sentence with "dude" or "guys"..

The landmark in Sydney's urban panorama: the Opera House! What was an architectural and construction challenge resulted in a masterpiece. This multi-venue performing arts centre was meant to cost 7 million dollars and to be built in 4 years. In the end it cost 102 million dollars and was built in 14 years!! Jørn Utzon, the original architect, was dismissed during the construction and was not invited nor mentionned at the official inauguration.

The Opera House dominates Sydney's Harbour 

and is backgrounded by Sydney central business district.

During our walking tour through the city centre we found ourselves in a Matrix scene. In the end there is only one question: the blue or the red pill? ;)

Martin Place fountain featured in the Matrix

Parks in Sydney offer an appreciated break from urban life. One can experience the amazing autochthonous nature with a lot of strange plants and colorful birds flying freely that we had never seen before. And Sydney hosts a colony of bats in the botanic garden. So strange to watch them perched on trees in the middle of the city in the daytime.

 Grey-headed flying-fox bats

Another way to connect with Mother Nature: taking a ferryboat for half an hour to reach the wonderful beaches of Manly. It is also the cheapest way to cruise in Sydney's amazing harbour!

Manly beachside

And for our first meeting with sharks: Sydney Aquarium! We really enjoyed this place. It presents a rich collection of marine life and a wonderful exhibit of the Great Barrier Reef. The aquarium is well conceived to untertain adults and children.

Shark

 Great Barrier Reef exhibit

Dugon

Long-necked turtle

Skate