Here are the cold hard facts:

1. I moved to Balmain and didn’t have internet connection for a few days.
2. I was in Melbourne for business for 5 days so I haven’t been home to do blog work.
3. Work has been busy so I haven’t been able to bludge and do markumentary stuff.
4. My mate Michele (super cool hot Bajan friend from Canada who I worked at Club Monaco with and went to uni with) came to visit me and we did a road trip to Tasmania - which is a great lead in to my blog entry today…

It’s been a good 10 months since I actually packed my back pack and travelled around this great country of theirs (not mine, theirs). So, when my friend Michele came to visit me from Canada, I took this opportunity to do just that. I had 4 days to spare from work, so when I told Michele (who had a week to play with) she said one thing - LET’S GO TO NEW ZEALAND! To which I replied. Jigga wha?

So here’s the itinerary that Michele conjured up for New Zealand:

Day 1 - Fly to Queenstown, drive to Milford Sound (where they filmed The Lord of the Rings) which was a 13 hour drive, do all of Milford Sound, traverse the mountains, and drive back around the mountain (another 13 hours), past Queenstown and up the west coast to Franz Jozef which was an additional 6 hours away. Umm… perhaps I should tell Michele that there are only 24 hours in a day.

Day 2 - After crashing our car off the cliff of the treacherous mountains of New Zealand, we were to resurrect from the dead because Michele wanted us to be at Franz Jozef so as we can see the glaciers. Glaciers - because she hadn’t seen any before.  This coming from the girl who was raised in CANADA! Where we we have our own damn glaciers in British Columbia, Yukon, Northwest Territories, Alberta and I am sure the lovely people of Nunavut have a couple of glaciers that they snowboard off of themselves. But no… she wanted to see the glaciers! Cha.

Day 3 and Day 4 - Killing each other.

So as you can see New Zealand wasn’t in the cards for us, but surely if God closes a door, it is almost certain that He will open a window. That window came in the shape and form of Tasmania. One of the 6 states in Australia and home to the world famous Tasmanian Devil.

The next morning we found ourselves in Tasmania. Yay!

We had a 4 day road trip planned out (thanks to Michele - who had gotten much better at doing up itineraries by the way!). It was going to be action packed, fun, adventurous, exciting and new. We were both excited! So what happened as soon as we got there?

We got lost.

Michele will have you believe that it was all my fault. But of course, if you want the truth, you would listen to me. I don’t embellish at all. I tell the truth. So the truth of it was, Michele can’t read maps. So we got lost.

But - the upside to all this, is that I saved the day, and I swallowed my pride and decided to pull over to a petrol station and ask for directions. Then we were on our way…

First destination - Freycinet National Park to see Wineglass Bay. Doesn’t it just sound delisicious? Well, it was. The only problem was was that I got us lost and Michele got mad at me. Ha ha! You see, Michele has a problem with her knees after many years of cross country running, her knees were pretty much shot. So, when I decided that we were going to walk this way (pointing right), we were in fact taking the 4 hour hike to Wineglass Bay instead of going this way (pointing left) which was the 1 hour short cut to Wineglass Bay. Oops. My bad.

What made it worse was that I forced Michele to take pictures of me with the beautiful backdrop, whilst she was trying to concentrate on not cutting her legs off at the knees. But at the end of the day, we got this other couple to take a picture of us with the Bay behind us, with the sun slowly setting. It was brilliant. It was happy. It was the end of day one. 3 more to go.

After spending the night driving amid the Tasmanian night sky, we managed to dodge wallabies, possums and echidnas. We finally found a hostel. We rested and fended off the weirdos on our floor. Day 2 had us start in Launceston, the second largest city in Tasmania. Where we drove to Stanley to see the Nut. It was a good drive up to the Nut (which is a giant table top land mass, a la Ayers Rock in Alice Springs otherwise known as Uluru). Found in this quaint sleepy little town of Stanley was this giant land mass that gave us a birds eye view of the northern coast line of Tasmania. It was spectacular. On the way down to our next destination Cradle Mountain, Michele decided that we were going to take a short cut and chose this dirt road, off the beaten path, otherwise known as the road to death! We both got scared and decided to turn around and take the long way. Michele called me a scaredy cat, and I told her that I couldn’t stand her driving. After hours of name calling, we started singing show tunes in the car to keep our mind off the fact that we spent most of the day LOST than actually sight seeing.

Day 3 Michele wasn’t feeling well at all, as she was fighting off a sore throat and headache. So we spent the morning doing the famous Salamanca Markets and then travelling to Port Arthur where we did an about face as soon as we found out that we would have to pay $35 for a walking tour that both of us didn’t want to do. But it was actually a blessing in disguise because we had lunch at this cute little cafe where this kind waiter told us where to go instead. We discovered Cape Pillar and the Awesome Caves. You will have to check out the pictures on markumentary.com to see what how ‘awesome’ this cave was, cause seriously, this place was AWESOME hey.

Day 4 was the end of our end of Tasmanian trip.  The end of our Amazing Race. The end of Tassie. But not the end of our friendship as you may think. Amid our arguing and bickering, I would have to say that I would rate that trip as one of my best, most memorable trips I have ever had the opportunity of taking with a friend.

So that, my friends, is the reason why I haven’t been able to blog for sometime. I have been quite consumed with work and moving flats that I have even forgotten why I came to Australia in the first place! TO TRAVEL AND DISCOVER! So I am glad that Michele came to visit me, and I am even more happier that I have done this trip with her, because there is nothing like living in Paradise and having to share it with those that you care for and love.

Until the next road trip mates… Any takers? Ha ha… seriously. I can drive and have a great sense of direction. Really I do!