Comm Games

Well I the comm games are over, I suppose there's no excuse to not be doing work now...here are some pretty pickies from the Athletics and the Rugby 7's.

















Suz and Marty and special guest Andrew (from Syd) at the Rugby 7's.
















Full house at the MCG






















Gab (Marty's training partner) and the others in the Hammer















The mens 100 m final

Destruction...

I went out on Saturday morning for two hours thinking it was just another normal day, but to my surprise when I arrived back the house next door was being eaten up by a crazy claw! It took me a while to work out that the house had not just fallen down but was being demolished. Why they would want to do that baffles me it was a really nice house. Anyway, apart from the noise and dust everywhere I suppose its alright (note: very strong undertone of sarcasm) I now have a perfect view into my new neighbours lounge room when before my place was perfectly private. Also, I can just imagine the block of units I suspect will be built there will give me even less privacy. Hmmm, maybe its time to move.

View from my kitchenView from my bedroom

Final word on the overland track...

I should mention that all the pickies were taken by Marty on his snazzy camera
http://elario.deviantart.com/

Day 6: a big juicy steak here I come...

We woke up bright and early to make it to Lake St Clair in time for the ferry. We saw an amazing sunrise and many new birds for Jarrod's book...finally arriving at the ferry they told us it was all booked out too bad, but I managed to talk them around to sending us another one. Lake St Clair certainly was in brilliant form for us, we were told that its very unusual to have sunny blue skies for more than two days in a row but we got five, cant ask for more than that. A bus ride later we were in Hobart and feasted and drank for three days to our stomachs content. Bye bye overland track..until next year!
Sunrise outside our tent over windyridge.Mt Olympus and Lake St Clair at the end of the trackPicture perfect
Suz, Marty and Jarrod.

Day 5: a nice easy stroll past waterfalls

After climbing hills the day before I was very glad to have a nice relaxed day walking to the next hut...we passed lots of waterfalls and would have seen them all but the privateers were blocking our path (seriously those people talk too much). The best part of the day was a splash around at the waterfall base, man we are all getting a bit stinky!
Post splashing around bliss!

Day 4: To the top of Mt Ossa

Todays mission was Mt Ossa, the tallest mountain Tassie has to offer...and my favourite day of the trip! Mt Ossa is behind covered in fog....Oh dear I think I have caught the mountaineering bug
Marty and Suz sitting at the top of Tassie, yes we are as tired as we look.
Walking/scaling back down is definitely easier, this is the view about half way down.OK, I really enjoyed this meal after a hard days work...the view certainly wasnt bad either.

Day 3: the long walk

Everyone else set of bright and early for the 17 km trek today, but we decided to take it easy having a nice sleep-in and a big breaky. Another beautiful sunny day it turned out to be and a relatively easy walk. I had a very close encounter with a large Tiger snake along the way, just after lunch I set off leading the pack and to my surprise and I'm assuming its as well I came face-to-face with a large and very black snake, I promptly screamed and ran the other direction and it did the same (minus the screaming). From then on I was in middle of the group and on guard..toward the end of the trip I read that only one person in 60 years has died from a snake bite, if I'd known that earlier I would have been more relaxed, but in any case I didnt want to be no. 2.
The start of day 2 walking, we ended up in the distance somewhere

Pellion hut...I could happily live there.The day ended with a lovely swim in the river and a beautiful sunset.

Day 2 - goodbye huts hello tents

To our delight the next day was bright and sunny and provided lots of sunshine to dry off our soggy boots and indeed nearly everything else in my pack (next time a pack liner!). A nice stroll around Lake Will brought us our first meeting with the 'Privateers' which became the butt of most of our jokes for the reaminer of the track. These 40-ish old people pay lots of money to be carted around the track by professionals, dont have to carry anything and have all there food prepared and nice comfy beds to sleep in.

What a view!
Lake Will...some of us look more pleased about it than others.

Spirits were obviously raised today as 'homey suz' parades around in Marty's entire wardrobe.The stunning view from the front of our tent...I could have stayed here for days.This 30 second exposure shot of the night sky reveals more than the naked eye including a shooting star down the in the far left corner.

Day-1: Cradle Mountain is somewhere?

After a gruelling evening at Tamar backpackers in Launceston (dont ever stay there) where our packs got infested with ants and seriously all the locals must have been outside our window all night, we arrived at the start of the overland track with little to no sleep between us. We soon forgot all this however when we stumbled upon the view at Crater Lake and lightened our packs with some lunch. Next up a long windy path to the top where apparently Cradle mountain sits but I have yet to see it as it rained and gusted the whole way past, lots of fun though putting the wet weather gear to the test. After many hours of trudging through the rain which just kept getting harder we arrived a Waterfall Valley where Marty and I stayed in the hut (with 25 other people mind you + one loud snorer) and Jarrod braved the tent.
The beautiful view at crater lake...see that hill behind little did we know the weather up there!
Ah the first of many waterfallsWhat a shot...by this stage we were thoroughly drenched and apparently on our left is cradle mountain, which I still havent seen.

The view from waterfall valley hut, this made the thought of putting on rain sodden boots to the back of my mind