Today we left beautiful Sydney. My heart is sad because we really were enjoying our stay there, but it is hard to stay sad when you are headed out to exciting new adventures in a place you never dreamed you’d go! Tasmania is one of the six states that make up Australia, but it is the only one that is an island. Because it is off the southern coast of the continent (and thus further away from the equator), it is typically colder than the rest of Australia, and we are looking forward to some cooler temperatures. In fact, our weather in Sydney versus our weather in Hobart (the capital city) says this is definitely true!

After a relatively smooth (albeit in a tiny, cramped Jetstar plane) flight, we arrived to a sunny day in Hobart. I made a nice new friend on the plane (Sally), and felt like I was channeling my mom. Rob and I often joke that on a typical plane flight, we finish half a book each, while my mom disembarks with 10 new friends. Hobart has a fairly small airport, so we were in and out and into our Uber pretty quickly.

We got checked in to our hotel in downtown Hobart, the Customs House Hotel, which is a cool, old heritage-listed brick building right down by the harbor. It is very quirky and uneven, but that gives it a great feel.

We had no set plans for today, so we decided to do what we do best, and created our own mini tour of two locals breweries. The first, Cascade Brewery, has been brewing beers here since the 1800s, the building is in the heritage registry, and has been added to and renovated many time in the 200 years of history. They have a marvelous beer garden, and we spent a lovely afternoon enjoying their sunshine and flowers (and tasting paddle)!

Our second stop in downtown Hobart was Hobart Brewing. Although the scenery and beers weren’t as good as Cascade, it was still a fun stop.

From here we went on to a cool building in the harbor that has been serving up seafood since 1979, The Drunken Admiral. It was one of the best meals we have had since we arrived in Australia over a month ago, and the crazy maritime decor was fantastic. I loved this place!

We did some walking around the waterfront area of Hobart as well, coming across the University of Tasmania art building, the wharf, some starfish, and more. There was also another large Carnival ship (Carnival Adventure) in the harbor here. Take a look below at some of our fun sights!

We are going to try to get to bed early-ish (for us) tonight, as we have to leave the hotel by 6:45 a.m. tomorrow morning to meet up with our tour group and start our five day Tasmania “Fantastic Five” tour with Under Down Under. Can’t wait!

And lest you think we’ve forgotten… for those who might be wondering, a final check of the mystery Rotting Panda delivery in our lobby in Sydney before we left revealed… absolutely no change. The bag and contents remain in the locked lobby, only now several more boxes have joined the pile behind it. On that creepy note, it appears to be a good time to vacate our building!

Thanks for adventuring with us!