Fires, Markets and Museums

Tasmania, like a fair bit of Victoria, has been on fire this last week. I mean forest fires, of course ("Bushfires" in the vernacular).

It hasn't been a problem too close to Hobart, but enough for us to have a haze across the city and a smell too, last weekend. The fires are much worse up on the north east - Scamander has had a few houses destroyed (I drove through there when I moved here).

The Haze last weekend - as seen from our kitchen:


The view from our house at night is great, too. It doesn't come out too well without a good long zoom, but you might get the idea from this photo:


Last weekend we had a look at the excellent Salamanca Market (walking distance from our house)


Then went on to the equally impressive Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, which had a great Antarctic exhibition.
When we left the museum I noticed the architectural variety on the doorstep ... this photo shows (left-to-right), late 20th century "government building", followed by a kind of New York pastiche, then 19th Century Colonial, and nearest the camera a classic Moderne/Art Deco. style newspaper press building. Interesting, eh?


We didn't get to do much walking, that's our big plan for xmas ... a long walk.

This weekend there will be mates of mine (Alec and Dave) arriving from the UK. Should be fun.

Here's a snap of me halfway up Mount Wellington a couple of weeks ago:


Ciao for now!