Swansea to Hobart - December 2nd

Leaving Swansea and saying goodby to oh-so-cute Armani and Donnatella was a sad one. But we really had a good time. And Piermont Retreat get 4.5 out of 5 stars in Ashley's Accommodation Review (AAR). Accommodation itself is a big part of my holiday and I always try to find unique places to stay - it's like having a really cool mouse with glow in the dark scroll for your laptop, you know you can do without, but it really makes the experience much more memorable. Impersonal, Macca style motel/hotel chains kinds of turn me off and I am known to my circle of friends with my experience of quite often come across acommodation disasters, like, no room actually booked when we get there, wrong type of room, two single beds when I booked a honeymoon package, and I had always make sure I threw a legitimate tantrum on these occassions. However, I think it is only fair if I tell all my friends about a place if it is really 'nice, different, unusual' too so I have come up with my own star-give-away system.

The FIVE stars represent: Value for Money (At the end of the day, I AM an Asian), Unique-ness, Friendly Staff(s), Privacy (best when no one can see us from the main road and no one can hear us), and the extra special bit that gives the place its own personality.

Piermont Retreat got the stars for value ($265 per night that sleeps for four with super ocean view from every single room), unique-ness (I have never ever stayed in a sand stone cottage, there is even special-made 'hole' in the wall for them to put the toaster), privacy (every cottage is quite a bit of distance within each other and Piermont Retreat is 3km away from the town centre). The good service we got from the hosts and staffs deserves a special mention here, Glen offered to let us use their industrial dryer just before we left as none of us supposely highly educated young professionals could work out how to use the dryer provided in the cottage. Think about how lucky we felt, and imagine our shock when Glen personally delivered our clothes back to us, all folded nicely!

Armani and Donnatella made up the other half a star. Honestly if Juan (the owner) let us bring them back to Sydney I would no doubt give the place full 5 stars (Or 6, now I think about it)!!!!

We drove past Richmond on the way to Hobart. Richmond is a nice little town, which reminds me of my favourite town Berry in NSW. It was also the start of the only glorious 3 days in Tassie where we had mobile reception. A quick check on Shang and she told us about the good news that after a special mention on the Sydney Morning Herald she's made quite a few sales and also got quite a few phone calls. (If you are a stranger reading this blog and you live somewhere in Australia and love a good party dress where no other girl would wear the same thing with you, Yuting's sister Shang makes really cool, feminine but comfortable evening and bridesmaid dresses, check out her website on www.halcyoncollections.com) Everything's good - we were ready to see what Hobart had to offer.

I guess Hobart was a little bit similar to Auckland, a nice sweet wharf, nice parks, and nice pubs. The smell of civilisation was really making an effect on Jeicy and she mentioned that she REALLY REALLY wanted to go watch Harry Potter (it had only came out the day before). So we basically spent $189 per person flying over to Tasmainia, to go watch Harry Potter - super.

I am a huge Harry Potter fan myself, but the whole movie experience was a real eye-opener. My conclusion: Teenage Hobart girls are SCARY. They were screaming 'Harry! Oh Harry!' throughout the whole 3 hours as if Daniel Clifftop or whats-his-name was in the cinema himself. I was also starving.

It was 9.30pm, and we were at 'Balls and Chains Grill', the place that makes Hobart's best steak, and we had to wait for half an hour for a table. It turned out to be worth all the waiting as the steak was super. We all finished ours apart from Eric, who was really struggling with his 500g Rump-steak towards the end. We finished dinner just before 12 and for the first time in a really long time, I felt like I had a (night) life. We normally go to bed way before 11 in Sydney but this is mid-night Friday in Hobart and we were up and shining, we were laughing, we were having good food with good friends and we were enjoying life.