Adventures with Maggie

I met my friend Maggie at a Weight Watcher's meeting in September, 2007. She has become a very good friend and I enjoy going places with her. Her family is just as friendly and welcoming as she is and they have entertained me quite often the past year or so. I will miss her terribly when I leave.


Maggie and Siew Wah Yeong.

Maggie and daughter, Stephanie

Maggie and daughter, Candice


Maggie is always introducing me to new people. This is BanEE. She is also from Singapore.

Eric, the owner of the Little Singapore restaurants. Maggie and I eat there quite often.

Chopsticks lesson at Little Singapore.

I love this fruit market. It has the best fruit and the owner helps us choose the fruits that are in season. He also lets us sample before we buy!

Maggie making room for our fruit purchases.

The Mango is a fruit that I like a lot. Maggie showed me how to slice it properly. There are several varieties of mangoes but my favorite is the Asian Queen (Maggie says it is named after her). The fresh fruits are one of the many things I love about Australia.

Maggie had me pose by these huge bags of rice to show how big they were. I am holding a jar of hot chilli sauce. I add it to my Weight Watcher's chicken fried rice dish to spice it up a bit.

That is one big bag of rice. It would probably last me the rest of my life. That is 55 pounds of rice.

Maggie pointing to her favorite tea. She has introduced me to many kinds of teas. I certainly enjoy my morning and afternoon teas. That is one habit I am taking back to Indiana with me.

I bought a tea pot and some chinese tea cups to serve up the tea leaves I bought at Yuen's Market. I wanted to be able to serve proper chinese tea. Then BanEE told me that she uses a coffee mug and a tea bag to have her tea. How funny is that?

Leaving with my tea purchases. As you can see, I did not buy the big bag of rice.

Hobart, Tasmania, Australia

Keith had the Queen's birthday off so he planned a trip to Tasmania for the long weekend. It was our first trip there. It was a very rainy and cool weekend. He did not enjoy it much but I think there are many things to see that we didn't have time for.

The famous Salamanca Markets are every Saturday. As you can see it was not the best day for market shopping and we only arrived in Hobart in time to catch the last hour or so. I only purchased some Tasmanian Shortbread to have with my coffee. It was really good.

Fruits and veggies galore.

Keith with the Tasman Bridge in the background.

We stayed out of town a bit at the Rydges. It used to be an old institute for the blind. I think it was built in 1914.

The Penitentiary at Port Arthur

Port Arthur is the best-preserved convict settlement in Australia. The grounds are very large and you could easily spend a whole day getting lots of exercise walking over the grounds and reading stories about the convicts and the people who worked there. Keith loves historic things so he was quite interested in the stories about Port Arthur.

That is one small cell block. Several of the convicts were locked up for years for stealing cutlery and tablecloths.

I didn't leave him locked up for too long.

The Historic Shot Tower

This Shot Tower was completed in 1870 and is located 11 kilometers from Hobart. In the early days, it was used for the manufacture of lead shot.

It was hard to get a good picture of the tower. It is 48 meters high

Still a ways to go to get to the top. The staircase in the tower was the original scaffold and had 287 steps.

Molten lead was dropped from a great height where it cooled before hitting a tub of water at the bottom of the tower.

He was all smiles until he realized the the steps were wooden .

View from the top of the Shot Tower.

Tessallated Pavement at Eaglehawk Neck, Tasman Peninsula of Tasmania

This rare erosional feature forms in flat lying sedimentary rock on some ocean shores. These cracks formed through stress on the Earth's crust and were modified by the sand and wave action.



Unusual geological formations at the Tessallated Pavement.

The Tasman's Arch

Over the years, the waves have eroded the softer layers of the rock from below and the stronger top layers have withstood the forces of the water.


The Tasman's Arch

Fossil Bay Lookout

The Blowhole has a soft spot where the rock has eroded and when the waves build up pressure, they spray through the hole like a whale's spout.

The Tahune Airwalk

The Tahune Airwalk is set in one of Tasmania's most world renowned forests, the Tahune Forest Reserve.

That is Keith at the end of the walk. I was shocked he wanted to walk out to the edge.

Treetop views over the Huon River, Tahune Forest Airwalk.

People would throw coins of the walkway trying to get them to land on this tree trunk. Keith got his on. I missed mine.

Geeveston, Tasmania

Geeveston is a small Tasmanian forest town with a history connected to timber industries. We stopped by for a quick stroll through town and a cup of hot chocolate.

My friend, Maggie, knitted me this scarf for my trip to Tassie. It was very warm. The weather changed quite often that weekend.

This is what we think a Tasmanian Devil looks like. This carving was done with a chainsaw.

All around the town are statues and carvings telling the story of the region's founding people.

The Cascade Brewery is Australia's oldest functioning brewery, built in 1824 then rebuilt after a fire in 1927.

Trip is over. Waiting for the flight to take us back to Brisbane.