Our new housemate

We've got a new housemate. This week we discovered a baby Asian House Gecko living in our bathroom. It's been reappearing after dark for the last two nights.

We've known for some time there’s a gecko colony on our northern balcony. Garry's heard their loud and somewhat distinctive call echoing regularly from the main planter box. It's incredible to think they're happy doing their thing eight floors above street level.

However, this week's visitor is the first we've spotted in the flesh. Native to South and Southeast Asia these small geckos were originally tree dwellers but, since arriving in the 1960s, they’ve been thriving inside Australian homes and buildings.

Geckos were first spotted in Darwin. Since then they’ve progressively made their way across the Australian continent. Today you can find them in West Australia, the Northern Territory, Queensland and now as far south as Sydney.

Our little friend will eventually grow as long as 11cms. For now, he's an adorable 3cms.

Cradle Mountain Christmas

Garry and I are continuing our “staycation” year with a 12-day tour of Tasmania’s West Coast.  Regular readers will recall we visited Australia’s island State for the first time in December 2013.  At the time we raced through much of the West Coast.  The region impressed us greatly and we vowed to return for a more leisurely visit.

We flew to Launceston early evening on 23 December and collected our hire car.  The following morning was spent stocking the travel larder at Coles and visiting a couple of business contacts before heading towards Cradle Mountain.  Our route inland took us first to my favourite Tasmanian winery, Ghost Rock, where we collected a dozen bottles for the cellar.

Our next stop was a local cherry farm where we collected some tasty seasonal produce.  It was then on to The Truffledore on Cradle Country Farm.  As we drove into the complex, we discovered it was closed. However, the owner saw us and waved us into the visitor’s centre.  Much to our delight, we enjoyed a private truffle tasting session.

In 2013, we stayed at one of the luxurious spa cabins in Cradle Mountain Wilderness Village.  It was a superb venue.  We decided to chance our luck with another visit.  We were a little nervous that the cabins might have suffered some wear and tear in the intervening years.  However, we’ve needn’t have worried.  They’d been refurbished and were just as good as ever.

On Christmas Day we treated ourselves to a decadent lunch at Peppers Cradle Mountain Lodge.  The menu was superb.  The meal kicked off with a seafood platter, followed by a traditional Christmas roast dinner and finished off with a delicious shared dessert platter.

 Boxing Day was spent working off our Christmas Lunch. The day dawned with clear blue skies.  We drove up to Ronny Creek and spent the day hiking up to Marion’s Lookout (1223 metres). Our efforts were rewarded with an awesome view of Dove Lake and Cradle Mountain.  We then returned to Ronny Creek shortly after sunset to do a bit of Wombat spotting.  The experience was as awesome as it had been in 2013.

Our final day at Cradle Mountain was spent hiking the Dove Canyon Circuit, followed by a visit to the Devils at Cradle sanctuary.  We spent several hours watching the keeper feed Tasmanian Devils and Quolls after dark.  It was another experience just as awesome as the first time.

Aussie beach bums

Without a doubt one of my favourite places in all of Australia is Pebbly Beach.  It’s famous for its mob of friendly beach-loving kangaroos.  Here you can wander among its native residents as they go about their business among the sand dunes and grassy knolls of a popular surfing beach in Murramarang National Park.  The sight of kangaroos on the beach is truly iconic.

I first visited Pebbly Beach in 1990 and was blown away by the experience.  This is one location that genuinely lives up to its Instagram hype.  The kangaroos here really do bound along the beach and they’re not the least bit afraid of their human spectators.  Garry and I visited the beach again while returning from what’s fast becoming our annual pilgrimage to the Narooma Oyster Festival.

Our latest return visit was just as memorable.  Garry was simply blown away by the number of kangaroos we saw and their fearless nature.  We were also delighted to spot several carrying joeys in their pouches.  Even better, for almost half an hour we had the entire beach largely to ourselves.  What can I say?  Pebbly Beach is truly a unique Australian experience.  We’ll definitely be back to enjoy it all again.