Day 16 (Rest day - Launceston)

Today was a ripper day. I met some other great people and managed to fill a lot of great things into the whole day.

I went to the Gorge with the Aussie bloke I met yesterday, a Japanese guy I made friends with and an Italian bloke I met in the morning. These were all nice guys and I really had a great time. We jumped off a few big rocks into the river and watched a few crazy locals do some backflips into the water. The Aussie bloke had to be back by 3:30 so he could get a flight back to Melbourne. The other two, plus a guy from Hong Kong in the hostel came along with me to the local James Boags brewery. This was a really fun afternoon. We all got to try the local beers, got up to a bit of mischief and watch the Hong Kong fella pass out after having 1 and a half beers. This was even funnier when the Japanese guy and I left, as we saw the bloke from Hong Kong walking in the wrong direction and nearly get hit by a truck, as he was so drunk he couldn't remember where he was going. We got a hold of him and made sure he was safe.

We walked to a local park and met a few local boys. This was nice, as we kicked a footy around, well an American gridiron ball, and spoke about some of the things happening around Launceston. They were wrapped to meet some people from Japan and Hong Kong, although I think they thought they were from the same country. They were also wrapped to meet someone from Melbourne.

After this we cooked up a big pasta back at the hostel. We all cooked together and mixed whatever food we could scrounge up. This was a really nice way to wrap up a perfect day.

Not long after dinner someone smoked out the kitchen and caused the fire alarms to go off. I was amazed by how fast the fire fighters came and the fact the hostel didn't tell them not to bother coming in as it was only smoke from burnt dinner. It was very obvious to see, and very clear that nothing caught fire. I thought that fire fighter were perhaps required to come in due to government regulation, or insurance reasons. It gets on my nerves when I see things done in a systematically flawed manner, as a result of regulation requirements. Something similar to watching 6 lazy people earn 30$ an hour to watch a construction crew work, as they are "supervising there safety". Although I've earned good money doing something similar to this on the railways I still hold no quarrels in objecting to these regulating requirements. Something has to change with this in our already nanny state controlled society.

Tomorrow will be my last day in Tasmania, as I head up to Devonport to board the ferry around 6:30pm.