DAY 14 – Start of the Wooden Boat Festival 2019
Today is the start of the WBF, the inaugural sail past starts at 12 noon and we have invited the gang to come out on Nashira to watch.
Prince of Wales Bay Industrial area
The wind is pumping a strong 20 to 25 knot N or NW which made it difficult for the tall ships to put up their sails. The little boats were flying around, sometimes getting knocked pretty hard. It was a challenge for all young and old. We ended up furling our headsail and motoring amongst everyone and mainly staying out of the way.
We tootled around Derwent sailing squadron and ate lunch before heading back to our little home berth at POW Bay marina.
Afterwards we grabbed a taxi into town spent the day walking around the WBF soaking in the atmosphere.
DAY 15 – 9th Saturday
Up early we headed back into Hobart for more WBF and Salamanca markets today!
So far I have found the food to be spectacular. Particularly the fruits and vegetables. Today I bought strawberries and blueberries at the market that taste out of this world. I am not exaggerating they taste better than I remember them tasting as a kid straight out of the garden. So good, so flavourful, so sweet. Then I found the bakery at the south end of the market. I umm’e and aww’d over what bread to get, Valerie helped me to finally decide to get the Rye sourdough signature loaf and OMG it is soo good. (Note: we had to leave for Sydney the following Saturday at 10am flight for Sydney so I couldn’t buy another loaf – sad face ;-()
All of us met up with new comers Martin and Anna at the Whiskey bar (Great meeting place! – oh and we hit the half price cocktails again!! Woohooo!!)
DAY 16 – 10th Sunday
Back to WBF again. I love this festival, no sales, no pressure and the ability to have a look at many impressive vessels and catch up with friends. John Eastway and Mike McEvoy are here on John’s flagship SV Flemingo.
Winifred is here, a Morten Bay cruiser type vessel (these guys helped us with hints and tips on how to get to Port Davey & Bathurst harbour 2 years ago). Tom is here on ‘Lynn Denne’
School friends of Evan’s, Brian, his wife Lea and his brother David, recognized Evan and called out his name in the crowd. Wow, that was impressive. We have planned to catch up with them later on in the trip
A couple of things I really liked seeing were 1) the old school way of working with green wood. A couple of young guys are bringing back some of the old skills and watching them turn a log into a table leg (sort of) using a long branch with string attached at one end and secured to a peddle at the other end, the string was wound around the log and held on a stand. The fellow then pressed the peddle which turned the log and he was able to cut a groove into the log with a sharp knife type thing. Technical term of course :-D! it actually worked very well.
The other thing I particularly enjoyed was seeing the ‘ships in a bottle’ display and talking to the fellow who does this.
This evening we spent time with Valerie (who was meeting up with a girlfriend who was driving down from Devonport after catching the ferry across from the mainland) we had a most delicious round of Ice Cream in the Green Mures building next to constitution dock and had a good seafood dinner at Pearl & Co with Martyn and Anna.
It has been a full and enjoyable day. I have to say holidays are a wonderful way to live life. Is it possible to do this all the time?