Our bikes are very sturdy but heavy steel framed hybrids. Triple chain ring with lots of low gears. They are about twice the weight of our road bikes and have fat chunky 38mm tyres compared to our slim 23mm road tyres. They are easy to ride and will do us well. We each have two new Ortlieb (the very best German) panniers on the back and a small pouch on the handle bars.

My bike needs a new cassette and chain as it slips a lot when in low gears. Manfred says these bikes will be replaced by wonderful new ones next year but he probably says that to all his clients every year.

Kevin and Owen will be interested that we took a different route from Hobart to Richmond to the one Pedaltours used in 2013. We crossed the Tasman Bridge, not the Bowen Bridge, and the Clarence Foreshore Cycleway around the harbour to Bellerive.  Then Cambridge Road through suburbia to Cambridge and the B31 through farmland to Richmond. This route bypassed Grasstree Hill and only had the bridge and one moderate hill to climb.

Tasman Bridge was quite an experience. 1.4km long and 60m high, about the size of Auckland Harbour Bridge.  There is a narrow  footpath separated from the traffic with a low rail and a higher rail on the “drop off the edge side”. Meeting oncoming cyclists and pedestrians was interesting as we did sideways contortions to squeeze past.

The ride around the harbour through forest was very pleasant and we stopped at the boat harbour in Bellerive for coffee to slow the journey down as it was such a short day – 30kms. Here we got a bit lost but Brian charmed two blue rinse ladies into showing the route on their iPhone. Manfred’s tour notes are detailed in the extreme and he says a few odd things.

eg:” halfway down you go ignore the right turn off of the Rose Bay esplanade what is signposted as the Foreshore cycle way”.

From Cambridge we did 17km on country roads past many vine yards and “pick your own fruit” farms. The road was quite busy but no buses and only one eighteen wheeler.

At Richmond it was farmers’ market day so quite a few people around but no coach tours so the tourist places were not crowded out. Yesterday there was a cruise ship in town in Hobart and I think they all went to MONA to get out of the rain!

Richmond is one of three Georgian Historic towns in Tasmania, dating from the early nineteenth century. It is noted for having the oldest bridge, prison and Catholic Church. We did a tour of the prison which operated from 1825 till 1851. The best thing about it is that today it is still exactly like it was in its heyday. It had up to 70 prisoners, mainly men but also women, and included bush rangers and captured aborigines. Tasmania was divided into ten police districts of which Richmond was one. The prison here is five years older than Port Arthur. Most of the public buildings and many private houses and structures were built by the convicts. They were assigned to settlers and used basically as slave labour.

We are staying in a lovely two bedroom, two storey apartment, called the Barracks. Part of it dates from 1830 and the new parts have been constructed using matching materials, proportions and detailing. Living, dining, kitchen, bedroom, bathroom downstairs and another bedroom and bathroom upstairs in the roof. Would like to stay here a few days.

Yesterday was a grey day all day and it looked like it could rain anytime . However despite the clouds often being black we escaped and had a nice dry warm ride in light winds. Long may it last.

Day 2 in Hobart was a very mixed day of exciting highs and frustrating lows. We awoke to the sound of rain beating down on the roof so heavy that some of it stayed in the gutters and downpipes and the rest cascaded off the roofs everywhere. We new it was forecast so weren’t taken by surprise.

Breakfast is provided in the room here. A totally processed, prepackaged meal courtesy of Kelloggs (cornflakes), Devondale (long lifeless milk), Rivianna (cubed fruit salad), four slices super white toast, Western Star (yellow grease that may contain dairy), Kraft (icky spreads). At 5am (still on NZ time) it all tasted dam fine.

We booked to go to MONA (Museum of Old and New Art) and used their fast catamaran from downturn for the half hour trip up the harbour. The ferry had two classes, the Posh Pit up front with leather couches, the best views and waiter service, and Standard (us) down the back with the engine noise. Actually the standard for everyone was very good and the refreshments were as good as any upmarket cafe. There was lots of art everywhere, a full size white cow, sheep seats, crazy graffitied walls, doors and toilets.

I noticed that my camera was not playing back and not recognising the memory card but otherwise seemed to be okay.

In Seattle last year Dale Chihuly’s Glass Museum and Garden and Frank Gehry’s EMP were mind blowing experiences and MONA is also. The museum has entry, Cafe, gift shop etc at ground level and three subterranean levels of galleries. From the pier there are 99 steps to climb through a sandstone gorge to the entry level. Then a spiral staircase down through a rock shaft to the bottom gallery (basement 3). There you get your headphones and “O”.

There are no labels on any walls or art, everything is on your little touch screen pad – the “O”. This is brilliant, a huge amount of information, maps, directions, tells you what you have missed, where you are and you can email your tour home. From here you wind your way back up through a maze of amazing spaces. Some high and cathedral like, some tiny and claustrophobic,  some nearly black and some strobe lit, some soft and some harsh and glarey.

Art all the time from 100BC Egyptian mummies in the Death Gallery to a crazy weird frankensteinian glass stomach thing that feeds, farts and poos.

All pretty puzzling and provoking and lots of fun.  A wonderful bar carved out of the rock. Think velvet, sandstone and making eyes at the chick with the black nail polish while you slurp your post modern Martini.

And all the time it was persisting down with rain so we didn’t get to see anything of the outside sculptures or garden. I took heaps of photos but was a bit worried about the camera and sure enough went to a camera shop on the way back and the photos do not exist. Some electronic problem with the camera not recognising my or any memory card, otherwise was acting okay.

After lots of fluffing around bought a little Nikon Coolpix S3700 which I will use for the rest of the time here. The Nikon has wifi and I downloaded  the app for my tablet but can’t get any photos transferred yet. So maybe no more photos – sob!

Brian has arrived and late in the afternoon met up with the precise and thrifty Manfred from Green Island Tours who set up the bikes, panniers,  gave us maps etc and we each got an interesting bottle of Langmeil Resurrection 2010 Mataro wine. To drown our sorrows with?

Starting this trip from the Airport motor Lodge in Miramar worked out quite well. A 4.45am check in for a 6.15 flight makes for a crazy middle of the night start from Raumati.  We were just a 5 minute walk from hotel room to the terminal.

Getting here all went without a hitch. The flight from Melbourne to Hobart is only 1 hour 15 minutes but the Airport Shuttle took far longer to do the 15km ride from the airport to our hotel. The bus was full and we were the last of about 15 drop offs. Still we got a site seeing tour of Central Hobart but alas no commentary.

Hobart is one of our favourite Australasian cities, small, compact and built around a harbour, like Wellington. It has a relaxed, cool, laid back vibe. Not so much of the in your face, crass, materialistic consumerism of bigger cities with their breathless headlines of sports stars/TV hosts/sex tapes/miracle babies/tragic childhoods/ dream weddings/drug busts etc, etc.

I think Hobart was fortunate to somehow miss the whole 1980/1990s. In Wellington and elsewhere in the 1980s almost every heritage building was demolished and replaced with brutalised concrete and reflective glass. Then in the 1990s the rest were replaced with plywood, polystyrene plaster crap.

Did anything good ever come out of the 80s – music, cinema, fashion, art? Oh wait – our three kids all came from the eighties!

Anyway Hobart has an abundance of wonderful old buildings that are now cherished and highly valued. A legacy of an endless supply of high quality sandstone and a supply of cheap convict labour.

Our hotel is in Battery Point, a heritage area similar to Thorndon or Panell, is 5 minutes walk downhill to the Salamanca Market and the waterfront. It is one of those places advertised as “character’ or “boutique”, a bit older, run down, creaky floors, you take your chances plumbing,  never look under the bed, no elevator, people you see in the corridor you don’t want to make eye contact with.

We love them, better then a bland Best Western any day. They are usually in interesting locations, have weird artwork and the colour schemes are done by someone’s mother in law.

The wifi only works in the bar downstairs. This is a trick every hotel should use to maximise profit out of selling drinks.

We had a meal in the bar last night. Quite a few single men hunched on their stools soulful staring into their beer. But there was an interesting mixed group of about a dozen, perched on their stools, all over sixty, having a great time, all chatting, laughing and squealing. They were having a trial to select a team for the Wednesday Quiz Night. One guy had an endless list of trivia questions.

No matter what the question the answer was always the same: “Hey I know that one, it’s what’s his name, as you know, jeez it’s just there, he was in that other thing, oh god it’s right on the tip of my tongue, hang on hang on it’ll come, yeah nah”.

Then some ridiculous guesses, some crude comments, a gulp of beer and a dive into the iPhone. About 10 minutes later someone would come up with the absolute correct answer but by then the show had moved on and nobody cared.

The other interesting thing was their teeth. If they all contributed there may have been enough for one full mouthful of teeth among them. They also had that look people get in their jaws and cheeks when too many teeth are removed and not replaced with implants or dentures. So I guess with shot memories and bad teeth it was too much pot and not enough dentistry – back in the 80s!

This blog  has been set up for when we walk the Camino de Santiago in May/June 2016.

We are very new to this and definitely have our “L” plates on, so please have patience with us while we learn the ropes on our Tasmania trip.

If everything turns to custard we will revert to emails and flickr (www.flickr.com/photos/psyclistpaul/)