my stories
TAGGED: adventures, my stories, traversing, wandering, wonderingOver the next little while, I’ll be telling a few tall tales from our recent trip to Tasmania.
When I came home from the trip, I had a small list of ideas for the virtual bonfire that is Scrine. We were only away a week or so, so the list is not long.
I can’t help but wonder why I haven’t done the same for our big trip last year. After a month away, there was so much food for thought it was a feast. I certainly intended to share some of that time away, but each time I came to write my head was too full of strong images and intense emotions. In the end, the wintery and intense feeling of belonging and then the feeling of no longer being there was all I wrote about.
I know, in part, this is because some of the places we visited are far too devastating a tale for me to do the story justice. I think it is also because they are not my story to tell.
It might also be that my home, unbearably hot as I often find it to be, is inherently my home. It’s where I find it easiest to think.
Still, if I attempt to be honest with myself, it’s probably just about the mechanics. When I travel through places like France, Poland and Russia much of my available brain activity is spent panicking over whether I can correctly order a coffee, read a street sign or ask for help.
Yet, I haven’t given up. I’m hoping that the next few tales of traverses in Tasmania will help untangle the tales from Europe.
It will be fun trying. A road paved with tales. Are you packed and ready to go?
Let’s see if I am.
my country
TAGGED: adventures, my country, my stories, traversing, wandering
Ah, adventuring is such great fun.
There’s the preparation. The thinking about it, the doing of it, the lying in bed worrying at it. Then, eventually, there’s the adventure itself.
This adventure takes place in my country. Not my home, exactly, but a little bit further south of where it lies.
Where shall I start? Shall we dive right in to the middle? Will we delve into the microscopic detail? Or shall we stroll along and just see what we find?
Let’s kick up our feet and start from the top. Which is not the same as the beginning.
I’ve always loved to walk. Not quite so much as a swim, but it’s that same feeling that if I didn’t have a reason to stop maybe I never would. I can see that the older I get, the easier it will be to stop. But that’s for then and this is for now. Of course, there’s walking and there’s walking.
Walking around hills and mountains is an unbelievable high. (Pun fully intended.) I wouldn’t describe it as a feeling of conquering. What an odd notion that would be. A human conquering a mountain? With what? A shovel and an awful lot of time?
It’s a mixture of feelings. It’s a feeling of fatigue and aching muscles. It’s astonishment at the raw beauty of the landscape. A dizzy sense of flying, on sight of the view from the top. It’s a sense of quiet and of stillness. It is, for me, a gentle sense of achievement and of overcoming the physical body. It is unbearably, bodily beautiful.
I’m no mountain-climber, but even little strolls, like those around Crater Lake, may give you an insight into what that would be like.
One thing is for certain, whatever it takes of you to make the walk, it gives it back to you a hundred-fold.
my bum
TAGGED: adventuring, bottom, my bum, my stories, night, wandering, wombats(a wombat’s tale)
No doubt you have heard of the wombat. If not, you certainly should have by now and I feel that this particular adventure may contain material too fascinating for your young years and you should look away now.
One of our nights on our great local adventure was spent cavorting about in a mini-bus with a dozen other tourists, shining lights at the local wildlife. Also known officially as a spot-light tour.
I should, at this juncture, point out that this is done without guns. This is eco-tourism at its best and weaponry features nowhere.
Many wallabies and a possum or two were spotted by our over-excited crowd. There was even a Mexican stand-off between two possums, half-way up a tree, with one possum upside down. Apparently, it was a particularly fine tree.
The animals most likely to get our little crowd cheering, however, were the wombats. I don’t know why, though I suspect, for myself, it has something to do with our much loved Fatso the Wombat. Not as dexterous and multi-talented as Skippy, perhaps, but much loved nonetheless. Why did the people from the other countries love the wombat so much? Who can say. Your guess would be as good as mine.
Our driver even took the time to tell us about the amazing tunnel blocking and foe-crushing abilities of the wombat’s bottom. Amazing stuff. Not a bum you’d want to mess with, I can tell you. Even if it is the tallest tale I’ve heard spun in quite a while, it was done well and it was done by cover of night. Let the tale live, I say. Beware the wombat bottom!
In a particularly hair-raising moment, one wombat we spotted - Wombat on the right! Wombat on the right!! - was particularly close to the side of the road. Not a problem in itself. Unless your wombat thinks the bus looks like a great place to go under for a midnight stroll.
“No! No! Not under the bus. Not under the bus!”
At this point, all the passengers were crowding at windows trying to find the waddling rascal. He’s here! He’s safe.
The bus driver was most relieved. He hadn’t been looking forward to explaining to his boss how half of his passengers had become injured by late night traffic while trying to protect/look for a foolish wombat.
Most fun I’ve had in ages.
No photos, sad to say. It was pitch black, lined with ghostly gum trees and a soft spotlight gently highlighted each animal.
The next day, however, is where I got my bum.
Driving around Australia, you will occasionally, if you’re lucky, spot a wombat or two. Only for a moment, mind you, before they waddle remarkably quickly back into the bush.
This time, however, we spotted a wombat right by the edge of the road. We pulled up and he sat about nibbling on various tid-bits of fauna. He was in the distance at first, really only a speck, but it’s amazing what your eyes can bring close. Not wanting to upset him, I walked slowly closer and closer. Then suddenly he dashed, in a waddling way, across the road. Not into the bush!
So, there I was playing traffic warden for the wombat. As you can see above, he did make it safely to the other side of the road.
Wombat bottom and all.