Hobart Highlights

Saturday, 28 November 

View from Franklin Wharf of Elizabeth Street Pier

Daci & Daci Bakers @ 11 Murray Street is where we had to go for breakfast. 

 Owned by Cheryl and Nasser (see previous post), this European Coffee House or Viennoiserie, is even better than Lauderée in Paris and is significantly less expensive. 

If visiting Hobart, this is an absolute must!

Avocado, Tomato, and Marinated Goat Feta on Buttered Sourdough Toast @ AUD14

 Salamanca Saturday Market @ 8:30AM-3PM, regardless of weather

This is an impressive affair with some produce, quite a few food vendors, both high quality crafts and tacky crafts, several stalls selling distilled spirits (single-malt whiskey, gin and brandy), 2^nd-hand clothing, antiques including silver and a wide range of street musicians. Ned bought a fuzzy tiger hat/head piece (see photo) for a mere AUD10.

·      Brooke Street Pier
Grandvewe Sheep Cheese where we met Chris who introduced us to Tasmania’s only Sheep Milk Cheesery. We tasted and purchased the basic White Pearl, a Persian-style feta (AUD15), as well as several other yummy varieties. 
Steph, at the Port Arthur booth, convinced us to consider the full-tilt-boogie trip upon our return to Hobart on Wednesday, 2 December.

·     Grandvewe also produces a pinot paste from the leavings of the wine crush, sheep whey vodka and a vanilla whey liqueur.

Elizabeth Street Pier is where 

we met Phillip, a musician and retired piano tuner, who was playing delightful old standards on his clarinet while strolling with his wife Josie. Ned joined Phillip in song or two...

      

      

 ...at which point the Motorcycle Riders Association Christmas Toy Run arrived in Hobart. 

We waved and watched as more than 4000 motorcycles (mostly Harleys) roared past. 

As many were decked out in costume, Ned, caught up in the spirit, donned his tiger hat. It was quite a spectacle, actually right up there with the Tour de France that we stumbled onto en route to Mont Saint Michel two summers ago.   

Gasworks Cellar Door – 2 Macquarie Street, recommended by Chris (GrandVewe Cheese) where we procured some lovely hand-crafted Tasmanian wines, including a 2011 BreamCreek Pinot Noir (AUD34).

Tassie - Take One

Saturday, 28 November 

Geography

·      Tasmania is a heart-shaped island off the southeastern coast of Australia.

·      It is approximately the size of West Virginia.

·      30% of the island is designated parkland or World Heritage Preserve.

·      Tasmania claims to have the cleanest water and air on the planet earth.

·      Weather changes dramatically. One can experience all four seasons – sometimes within a single hour.

History

·      Wrongly assuming the island to be uninhabited (Aborignal Peoples had already been in residence 35,000 years), the Brits landed here in 1803 to expand their Australian prison network. Then called Van Diemen’s Land, this was a rather harsh penal colony. Between 1833-1877, some 12,000 convicts were imprisoned in Port Arthur alone.

·      The island’s reputation discouraged free settlers. Therefore, the population remained small, the land unspoiled, and the ex-cons got first pick of the prime real estate.

On our flight, Ned chatted with a fellow named Rick who traced his genealogy back 17 generations. Many of his antecedents in England, Ireland and Scotland committed petty crimes so that they could emigrate to Tasmania as “guests of the King” and therefore not have to pay for passage Down Under. Rick can also claim aboriginal DNA (on his mother’s side). 

Friday Night

·      The Black Footed Pig @ 8 Brook Street is where we went for dinner because (1) it’s across from where we are staying, (2) it features tapas, and (3) it looked really cute when we peeked in the window earlier in the day. What a find! We love chef-owned restaurants, and this one ranks right up there with the best. 

The chef, Nasser, smiled the entire evening while turning out gorgeous plates of beautiful food from his tiny kitchen with only one sous-chef, a dishwasher and his wife, Cheryl. Nasser immigrated to Australia from the former Yugoslavia (Montenegro then Kosovo). Upon learning that we are from the USA, he treated us to a dessert. The Black Footed Pig is newly opened and is Nasser’s “retirement” – He and Cheryl own a very successful European Coffee House a block away (successful = 1200 people served a day…).

Chef Nasser of Black Footed Pig

Embossed Napkins

Appies

Australian Open

Today was cold with intermittent rain. After late morning breakfast and more coffee (Have we mentioned that Melbourne has excellent coffee?), we took Tram 70 to the Rod Laver Arena (stop 7B) for a tour of the impressive facilities.

Because Hugh Jackman is having a huge concert there this evening, we were not able to go inside the arena to see Centre Court, so we got a discount, paying $12 instead of $18 (Australian) for an hour tour.

Off to dinner, our last night in Melbourne. Tomorrow, with luck and a prayer, we fly Jet Star to Hobart, Tasmania. We have been forewarned that Jet Star is the Spirit Airlines of Australia and that we can therefore expect for it to be an "experience"...

A Veritable Feast at QVM

Melbourne's Queen Victoria Market claims to be the largest open air market in the Southern Hemisphere, and it may just be that. Built in 1875, it is massive (to use the ubiquitous Australian adjective), sprawling, vibrant and bustling. Here one can buy anything from fresh produce to cosmetics to all manner of gee-gaws.

The entrance to the QVM

On Wednesday evenings from 4 November through 30 March, the QVM transforms its historic sheds into a multicultural melting pot of good food, beers, wines and music. You can easily eat your way around the world, with more than fifty purveyors of ethnic foods in one locale - including curly potatoes from Korea, paella from Spain, crêpes from France, and Who-Knows-What from Malaysia. It is literally a global feast - for the eyes, nose and palate.

We noshed on savory dumplings from Ant's Dumplings.

We also nibbled spicy popcorn chicken...

And, we enjoyed the music of a guitarist from Chile who played with a violist (as in viola, not violin) from Quito, Ecuador. Both are in Melbourne on scholarships studying for their Masters degrees - the first being a sound engineer majoring in cultural management; the second is studying music composition and plays professionally for the National Symphony in his home country.
(So, I got to speak Spanish on this trip after all!) 

City of Letters

In addition to having a plethora of independent bookshops (including The Little Bookroom, which specializes in children's books written by Australian authors - many of which I happen to own), the State Library Victoria is a must-see! Located at 328 Swanston Street, it is Australia's oldest public library and sets the bar high for what a public library can and should strive to be.

Highlight is the La Trobe Reading Room. Built in 1913, it is dominated by a magnificent dome that is 100' in both height and diameter with 15' oculus.

Original issue study desks are now fitted with Internet. 

Two upper floors feature 360-degree gallery of displays, including rare books and magnificent calligraphy. We saw a wonderful historical exhibit called "The Changing Face of Victoria" and watched vignettes from a video called "Writing the War: Personal Stories from WWI" - enacted a la Ken Burns-style via photographs, personal letters, and diaries from a nurse, bank clerk, farmer, artist and activist - among others.

Best of the day was the "Mirror of the World: Books and Ideas" exhibit with an illustrated first edition of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. 

The greatest authors and texts act as literary milestones, signposts marking the collective journeys of imagination.  

There also was a delightful exhibit on pulp fiction in Australia featuring Australian authors Marc Brody and Carter Brown. Apparently tales of tawdry affairs and crime dramas burst onto the literary scene in the 1930s, with American imports dominating the Australian market. Conservative forces wanted them banned, and forged an unlikely alliance with Australian publishers who took the position, "Why do we need to buy this mental rubbish from America, when we can produce perfectly good mental rubbish here in Australia." In the 1940s and 1950s American imports were banned, so Australian publishers had the opportunity to fill the void. Covers, as you can see from the photo below, employed bold colors. Women were portrayed as buxom stereotypes who were either quintessential damsels in distress or femme fatales. We've come a long way, baby?

FREE* Melbourne

After Hoosier Lane where we oggled the street art (NOT graffiti!), we ambled down a maze of other alleyways and laneways that are woven throughout downtown Melbourne.

With our newly purchased "myki" (My Key) cards (approximately $8US each*), we could now venture outside the FREE zone of downtown Melbourne using any mode of public transportation - trams, trolleys, buses, or trains until midnight. Heretofore, we had only traveled via the FREE City Circle - Tram Route 35, so despite the cost, we discovered new FREEdom.

We first went to the Shrine of Remembrance (Tram stop 19). Initially completed in 1934, the Shrine is situated on 13 hectares of beautiful parkland. Honoring Australia's participation in war and peacekeeping efforts, including the Boer Wars in South Africa, the Gallipoli campaign in Turkey, and how British command made decisions that compromised Australia in WWII. The Shrine also includes more current conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. We left with new perspectives on the legacy of war...

Volunteer Docent Alan and Ned @ The Shrine of Remembrance

With "remembrance poppies" in hand, we walked next door to the Royal Botanic Gardens. Founded in 1846, the Royal Botanic Gardens include 38 hectares of gardens, lakes and lawns with 10km of walking tracks. Dedicated to education, conservation, and appreciation of global flora, the Royal Botanic Gardens feature more than 10,000 plant species from all all over the world. We especially appreciated the California Garden that includes adaptable and water-wise species endemic to where we live: ceanothus, agaves, dudleya (endangered), salvia and California poppies. We had a lovely lunch in the Terrace Cafe, overlooking one of the lakes that adorn the property.

We next hopped aboard yet another tram to the State Library of Victoria and, even though it also is FREE, it is worth its own entry. xoxo

*This was the only expenditure, other than food, that we made all day!

Graffiti or Street Art?

With the exception of meals and our "myki" pass, everything we did today was FREE (no cost!).

We started the day with a walking tour of downtown Melbourne that Ned had found in his research for this trip. From Federation Square, very near our hotel, our first stop was Hoosier Lane, acclaimed for graffiti street art. Graffiti is illegal throughout Australia, including Melbourne. However, the City of Melbourne distinguishes graffiti from street art. Graffiti is marking another person's property without permission. Street art is artistic work done with the permission of the person who owns the wall and with the permission of the local council. Consequently, Melbourne is known for its "legal" street art, acknowledging that public spaces provide a gallery and stage for artistic expression.

"Do Art Not Tags" is a graffiti education program in Melbourne whereby actors visit classrooms and provide information about the differences between graffiti and street art and how different choices can make a positive (or negative) difference in the life of both the "artist" and the community.

More Melbourne Freebies in the next post!