Tasmania- Bruny Island and New Year's

First off, I am fully aware that a post about New Year's is being posted in March. in our defense, it is the second post inside of a week, which blows the doors off our recent posting rate. So, let's call it a wash shall we?

After taking a couple of blog diversions its time to finish off our Tasmanian vacation. We took a lot of pictures, but this is the second to last one. On New Year's Eve we took a boat tour of Bruny Island, which is one of the small islands off the tip of Southern Tasmania. An island of an island, the only way to get there is by ferry. Due to its remoteness, there is a ton of wildlife, and the scenery is absolutely gorgoeus. Also, apparently they grow a special kind of cherry that is highly coveted in Japan. Its sold in two places- Bruny Island at the road side shop, and Japan. Its such a lucrative business that its actaully cost effective for the owner to hire a helicopter to hover overhead and blow the insects off while they are picking the cherries. Seriously. They actually do that.

Anyway, I'm getting off topic. We signed up for the all day tour of Bruny Island, which took us by bus from the Hobart Docks, over the ferry, morning tea, a 3 hour boat ride around the island, lunch, and then back to Hobart. Here's Laurel and I sporting our stylish full length hoodie-coats to keep us warm from all the wind and water.

Our ride. It's pimpin'.

Just a pretty neat shot of lichen deposits on the rocks. We liked the colors.

Like I said, beautiful scenery. These cliffs are just impossibly high.

An impressive rock formation that they drove our boat through. I'm sure two months ago I could have told you what the proper name of it was, but sadly, I have forgotten. The one on the right looks like a king riding a llama though.

Now this was really cool- its a partially submerged cave. When the tide goes out air rushes in, and when the tide goes back in it forces all of the air out in a water explosion. Below is one of the pictures we took, very cool. After the third or fourth one, they shot the boat forward so the front half of the boat got soaked. Pretty funny. Unless you were the guy two rows in front of us who was NOT amused. He had his camera out (even though they told us to put it in a pocket or something when not in use) and told everyone who would listen that if his camera was broken he was going to sue someone. Surprisingly, he wasn't American. Also, his camera was fine.

Enough with the scenery, on to what we all paid our money for- the wildlife! Mounds of sea lions! Note the ridiculously large one on the left hand side posing. Apparently, sea lions segregate. The boys all stay together on one large rock, and the girls kind of scatter around in groups. No wonder in the boy section they were all fighting with each other.

One of the main draws of the Bruny Island Tour are the dolphins, and we got incredibly lucky. The dolphins were out in force, making some pretty spectacular jumps, swimming under the boat, and just being super-cool. Sadly, however, every dolphin sighting, while frequent was fleeting. Laurel got about 50 pictures of the ocean. Here's the best one we got- a bit of fin. Oh well.

On to New Year's Eve! By pure happenstance, one of Laurel's co-workers and her husband, Karen and Anthony happened to be at Hobart at the exact same time. AND they were able to get us into there table at the Taste Festival to eat, drink, and watch the fireworks harbor-side. Pretty awesome. Also, they're British, so it automatically made our night classy. (See our previous post about the Taste Festival) Here's a picture of us having a great time. And yes, it looks like someone else we don't know is taking our picture in the background. What can I say? When you are as hot as we are, it just happens sometimes. Its our blessing and our burden.

Oooooooooooooooh! Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Pretty fireworks over the water. Hard to beat that to ring in our first full year in Australia.