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Translation

Gone Wild

Apologies for not answering my email for the last few days. I have been indulging in that fine Aboriginal tradition called Walkabout where you drop everything and just take off into the bush.
Forgive me. We did just have three consecutive days of good weather!

Just to prove that I have not been entirely slack, I'll post some of my adventures forthwith. However, it is not without some trepidation and ambivalence.
Does it spoil it for you if I show and tell you what you are likely to see on walks? Or does it whet your appetite?

Will it make you want to come and do it yourself? This would be good as thanks to the high Aussie dollar and general economic uncertainty, tourism here is having a bit of a hard time, so come on down. This is absolutely the perfect time. Everything is green, but not yet as busy as it gets in summer and when school holidays are on. The parking lots and campgrounds are empty and there's lots of accommodation. I can't guarantee that it will be so pleasantly relaxed later in the year. On the other hand, the autumn is lovely here as well and the weather tends to be much more stable than in spring. It is also the time when concessions on airfares and ferries begin again, rather than paying the high season rates.

My oldest son says it doesn't matter if I show the pictures, because having the experience is quite different to looking at photos and each person's experience is unique. There will also be different weather, different seasons.
For many readers though, the chances of getting here to this remote island on the far side of the world are fairly slim, so if for you alone, I will put these pictures in. You will see that despite these enormous distances between us, many things are the same - we do have supermarkets and McDonalds and home comforts like flushing loos, mostly, but you will also find strange plants and animals and absolutely astounding scenery that you won't find anywhere else.

This brings me to my second concern. If I show these places to others, will they change? Or more to the point, will I be hastening their change?  Next time I come, will it be four lane highways and admission fees and I won't even be able to get in? In some ways I feel that if I find a beautiful place, I should keep quiet about it and keep it to myself. (You are thinking, Haha). On the other hand, I hardly mentioned to anyone the beautiful place we stayed in in Bali once, and still the government confiscated it and turned it into a multi - million dollar resort for the wealthy. So on the premise that it is no use singing and dancing alone and that change is inevitable, I may as well share it with people of similar interests and values. There are not after all, that many of you, especially since the break. Let me know though, how you feel about this, whether to tell all or not?

Meanwhile, perhaps I am doing this for the sake of history. To record places and experiences at some moment in time, while they are still exotic and largely wild, but still fairly accessible for non - Gortex owning, not too fit bushwalkers like me. People in the future may be amazed that we travelled so far in just a couple of days or, conversely, that we could still walk anywhere or walk at all!
I'll bet the person who took this film of the Tasmanian Tiger at the Beaumaris Zoo in 1933, had no idea that it would be the last one ever taken. This Tiger died in 1936 and marked the extiction of a species unique to Tasmania.




Yep! Come and see it all before it disappears,
xxx Roni

PS If you are the kind of person who would rather not see the pictures and prefer to discover everything for yourself, DO NOT READ the next three posts!

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