Tasmania Part 2

Feb 19th - We were a bit tired from our previous night trex and checked out by 11:00 am from our apartment. I had read so much about "Jackmann & Mc. Ross Cafe" at Battery Point, that I had to try it. One word to sum up the place - BRILLIANT. There were too many items that we wanted to try and the food is fabulous. Wish we had our breakfast there every day. We then started driving toward Launceston, which was about 2 hours away. I had booked Quest Launceston. Finally we got a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom apartment. The apartment is huge. Obviously, they had air-conditioning only in the living room. Really? How are you expecting people to sleep in the bedroom? They did arrange for fans and air coolers. Anyways, I had paid $470 for 2 nights. The location of this place is good. Very close to the shopping district. 

After freshening, we went shopping at the nearby places and picked up lovely stuff. Right after that, we drove to Cataract Gorge. It's a beautiful place, with a kids play area, swimming pool, huge area to walk and run. Also there was this bridge, from where you could see waterfall. I got excited seeing peacocks roaming around the area. There is a chair car to have an aerial view of the place, but it wasn't working on the day we visited.  We just spent too much time here enjoying the place, that we forgot that all eateries shut by 8:30 pm. We just had dessert from this amazing place and that was our dinner.

Feb 20th - We got out by 6:00 am to explore Cradle Mountain. I had booked Cradle Mountain Canyoning for my husband, while we were to hike up the place. The drive to Cradle Mountain took about 2-2.5 hours. At one point, it was like we were driving through clouds, so misty and scary. After successfully reaching the place, my husband geared up for his canyoning, while I set out for my hike. The hike (6.5 km) was very nice and my husband loved his expedition. I was dead tired, carrying my son during the hike but I met such lovely people who chatted with me along the way. Luckily here, we do get things to eat at the cafe. We left cradle mountain by 2:30 pm and reached our apartment by 4:30 pm. We had dinner at a lovely mexican restaurant nearby and finished our packing to leave the next day.

My Big Aussie Holiday

I recently came back from a 2 week Aussie trip. I have been planning this trip for almost a year. It all started when hubby said he wanted to go for Australia for 2015 World Cup. We managed to get the tickets for India-SA at Melbourne and India-Pakistan at Adelaide. We were initially to do this trip with friends, but due to various changes, we did it with MIL and neighbour.

Australia is huge and we wanted to do just a 2 week holiday. The number of places to visit at Australia are too many but we had less time. I certainly didn't want to go about visiting all the places, without really exploring it. The main places that I wanted to visit was Adelaide (because of the match), Sydney, Melbourne, Gold Coast, Brisbane and Great Barrier Reef. With a toddler, I knew it would be difficult to do the activities at Gold Coast and Great Barrier Reef. 

My travel agent, then told me about Tasmania. After reading about it, I felt I had to visit the place. I then narrowed down my list to Adelaide, Tasmania and Melbourne. Everyone were surprised that I left Sydney and Gold Coast. I just thought this itinerary would do justice to the number of days that I had. I roughly saw the places of interest in each place and I had calculated 3 nights at Adelaide, 5 nights at Tasmania and 5 nights at Melbourne. I then saw a deal on makemytrip for Adelaide hotel and I got an extra night free for the same price. So I was finally doing 4 nights at Adelaide, 5 nights at Tasmania and 5 nights at Melbourne.

Around August, we wanted to start booking our flight ticket. Malaysian Airline had put up a sale, with each ticket costing us Rs. 45,000 return. Now that was super cheap, when compared to Singapore Airline that I was getting at Rs. 65,000 return. By this time, we had decided to leave the little one with my parents. I was not confident about my decision, but I thought it would be better for the little one, considering the amount of travelling to do. And I really didn't book his ticket as well!!! 

Around last week of October, I booked my internal flight from Adelaide to Hobart in Qantas Airline. The ticket was charged Rs. 12,500 per person. Around the same time, I booked my flight from Launceston to Melbourne in Virgin Australia Airline. The ticket was Rs. 4500 per person. After a month passed, my son tells me that he will not stay with my parents and he would also travel with us. I called each airline and booked his ticket as well. Luckily for internal flight, it was almost the same price. But his ticket at Malaysian Airline costed Rs. 62,000 return. Now for a child, that was super expensive!! I was almost paying what I was paying for myself with internal flights!!

The next post will have details of all my bookings and what I did at Adelaide.