tasmania 1/2

April 5, 2017

Tasmania is, as they say, a mixed bag. I'm back on the road—pack strapped to my body, new places to see. My parents are visiting from Canada and we're travelling together. But I can't drive the rental car because I'm only 24, I feel like a child sulking in the backseat, I miss my Melbourne home and family, I regret moving out.

But new places to see. Nice nice very nice. Tasmania isn't what I expected. I'm not sure what I expected. It just seems like Australia.

I've been here too long.

It actually reminds me of Canada a lot. Forests, mountains, valleys, grasslands, lakes. Wilderness. Lack of cityness. After so long in the cityness, it's refreshing to be out in the wilderness. My parents and I go for hikes every day. We stay at Airbnbs—some pretty and some weird. I choose the music when we're in the car. Sometimes we talk about politics and society and where we think it's going and what we think it all means.

The first two nights are spent in Falmouth in a pretty cottage on a hill by the ocean with white walls and shells on its shelves. The sunsets are vivid and the moon hangs over the water. Down the road, there is a brewery where I drink a porter and watch the dusk come. Further down the road is Freycinet National Park where we hike to the lookout and look out over the ocean and the blue blue bay. A couple of yachts are parked in the blue. Dad jokes about one of them being his. Tourists are petting a wallaby and taking pictures with it and this makes me angry because that is not how you respect wild animals or keep them wild and back home that is how deer get hit by cars and bears get shot by people.

Our next home is a creepy little cottage in the woods where the milky way is bright and we all encounter our first big Australian spider. It appears comically next to the television as the man on the television delivers a story about spiders.

Each day is soaked with nature and trees. It's good to be outside so much. We hike through jungle woods and dusty forests and up ridiculously steep climbs to ridiculously beautiful views at the top of an extinct volcano called, The Nut. You can see for miles and miles. My parents are always bird watching—always following trills and whistles.

And I am always following light.