So the room here is quite nice. Little kitchenette but a bar fridge that didn't keep the ice cream frozen. The blinds are a bit dumb - you have to line them up to either have them partly open or closed (hard to explain I'll put a photo here at some point). And if you have them fully open anyone can see in because there's heaps of people just wandering the grounds. Bed is ok - two single beds joined to make a king. Somewhat soft though. Pillows very thick so used my own. Aircon works well and is quiet. Bathroom is nice, a little mold though (they don't refresh the rooms here every day so it builds up I guess).
Didn't get to sleep for ages after the late night seeing the penguins. Then woke up around 4:00 from a disturbing dream that we had to kill George (Kit's cat) for some reason. Heard the penguins at 4:51. Eventually got a little more sleep but not much.
Usual slow start and out the door around 9:20.
Stopped in the Freycinet National Park Visitors Centre first (Stu was hoping they'd have coffee, they didn't).
View along Freycinet Drive
Rocky peaks in Freycinet National Park
Got to the car park around 10:35 but then had to wait for ages for this buttplug in front of us who just stopped right in the middle of the road while waiting for their friend to go out and explore. Not once but TWICE. Seriously WTF is wrong with people??? The top two carparks were full so ended up in the bottom one which was fine because the spaces were a lot bigger for campervans, and seriously for 30 seconds of extra walking who cares. Clearly not aforementioned buttplug who must have sent someone out to look for parking rather than just driving around. Idiots.
So got to the trail heads and I went left and the sweetie went right. He went off to do the Wineglass Bay Lookout walk and I went for Mt Amos.
I blame my parents.
Started the walk at 10:55. The first little bit is a very gentle uphill path on a wide track. Then the path narrows and it gets steeper with climbey steps.
The start of the walk to Mt Amos - lulling you into a false sense of security
Banksia on the Mt Amos walk
Hit the rock face at 11:10. This is where it started getting tricky. The granite rock faces are fairly steep and even with my good grippy boots it was slippery in places.
How bad can it be?
Mt Amos
View over Coles Bay from Mt Amos track
Rock on Mt Amos
Lizard on Mt Amos track
But then if I thought *that* was bad, you get to even crazier climbs where I didn't even know if I'd be able to get myself up, let alone down. There was only one place I conceded and accepted a hand up, and another where someone offered to take my bag up a bit so I wouldn't have to negotiate it as well. Got to the top of all that around 12:55.
Things are starting to get a little silly
You want me to get up that?
Then it was a bit flatter but there were still some steep boulders to get across.
In the end made it to the lookout around 13:23. Two and a half hours after starting. Hurray.
I didn't die!!
So the view is indeed quite spectacular. And it had been somewhat cloudy all morning but just as I arrived at the summit the sun came out. So it was pretty amazing.
Wineglass Bay from Mt Amos
Wineglass Bay from Mt Amos
Dad has a photo of Mum on that rock
Wineglass Bay from Mt Amos
But.
I was so stressed about how long it had taken to get up, and I was so tired, and I was stressed about how long it was going to take to get back down again, and I WAS GOING TO DIE ON THIS MOUNTAIN that I couldn't really enjoy it. I did reproduce one of Dad's photos (minus the mother perched on top of the rock) but some of the others might have been taken on the other summit. I certainly wasn't going to venture over there by myself with no track and no other climbers coming and going and it would have taken at least another couple of hours so didn't go over.
View southwest from Mt Amos
View east from Mt Amos
View east from Mt Amos
View north from Mt Amos
So scoffed some chocolate and a cheese stick and had more water and put on some more sunscreen and started the descent around 13:52.
View back to Mt Amos from the path down
View to Coles Bay from Mt Amos. Now I have to go down over the edge of that cliff.
View back to Mt Amos from the path down
View to Coles Bay from Mt Amos
View back to Mt Amos from the path down
And had the song "dumb ways to die" going through my head the whole way down. Cause I really thought I was going to DIE on this mountain. Or maybe break some bones or a lot of skin.
But.
I didn't die. Or get injured (well other than a couple of my toes hurting and all my muscles are going to be sore tomorrow). God must have decided he didn't want me in heaven yet.
Finally got back to the trailhead at 16:10 - five and a quarter hours after starting. The poor sweetie was waiting for hours. I had told him he should go into Coles Bay or visit a beach or something but he waited. Best sweetie ever.
Wallaby at the car park
Following my parents' footsteps we then went out to Sleepy Bay and out to Cape Tourville Lighthouse to reproduce their photos. Well, the ones I could, on account of trees.
Sleepy Bay
Sleepy Bay
Sleepy Bay
Sleepy Bay
View to Lemon Rock
Cape Tourville Lighthouse
The Nuggets
The Nuggets
Peaks of Freycinet National Park
View south from Cape Tourville Lighthouse walk
View south from Cape Tourville Lighthouse walk
As I was about to get back into the car at Cape Tourville I almost trod on a wallaby. It was just sitting next to the car and there was a lady nearby photographing it. I grabbed some photos too in case it hopped away but it didn't it just sat there. Eventually I poked it and said dude you need to be in the sun for better photos. But it crawled under the car, looking like it was interested in the water dripping from the air conditioning. And I'm like dude that stuff is no good for you, so the sweetie pulled out a water bottle and it was totally epic thirsty and drank all the water Stu gave it. It was so tame it let me pat it. Weird stuff. I worry this thing has spent its life mooching off humans and doesn't know how to survive. hmmm.
Stu giving a wallaby a drink
Wallaby near Cape Tourville Lighthouse
View of The Hazards including Mt Amos from Coles Bay
View back to The Hazards including Mt Amos from Coles Bay Road
We wanted to pick up some tv dinners from the IGA, but we arrived at 18:05 and the place closes at 18:00 :( So got beer and chips from the Thirsty Camel.
Then back to the resort. For aforementioned beer and chips. And ice cream. Last night we put some ice cream into the freezer but bar fridges are no good for freezing ice cream and it melted. So I took it up to reception so they could put it in their freezer. Anyways I went back to get it, and Jim had bought us another one! So now we had one and two thirds tubs haha. We ate what we could of the new tub and took the remainder back up to their freezer.
Stu also figured out how to cast to the AndroidTV so we watched the last episode of season 3 of MASH (Abyssinia).
Then I backed up my photos, including saving the Mt Amos ones to OneDrive (cause there's no way in hell I'd ever be able to reproduce them now!)
Collapsed into bed a bit after 21:00.
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