Greetings ... This is going to be a brief entry because I'm working at a public internet terminal (more accurately, THE public internet terminal) at a bakery in Coles Bay, Tasmania, and a) I have 14 minutes credit remaining and b.) this may be the worst keyboard I've ever worked at. Some keys have to be hammered to work at all; others cast double letters at the slightest touch. Please forgive any misspellings that result.

It's possible I may not be posting as much as I hope during the vacation part of the trip. My laptop is acting up; the battery won't recharge. It was actually getting difficult the last two days of the Olympics, but now it won't work at all. I fear there's a short in the cord of the recharger (which would be easily remedied, at a price) or in the recepticle in the computer itself (in which case it's pretty much toast for the rest of the trip). This would mean no photos for the rest of these entries, whenever they occur. I'm hoping to get the computer looked at in Hobart tomorrow; that's the largest city in Tasmania, so if I can do it before getting back to the mainland, it would be there.

Anyway, as for the trip itself, all went well from Seoul to Sydney, although the flight was packed and we had to circle because of traffic for 30 minutes before landing (not what you want at the end of a 10-hour flight, or when you're making a connection). I still made my Virgin Blue flight to Launceston with ease, though, picked up my rental car there and made the 2-hour-plus drive to Coles Bay, struggling all the way with the right-hand drive and how that affects everything you do. (I don't think I managed once to hit the turn signals without hitting the wiper control first.)

But it was all worth it. The view from my cabin where I'm staying, the Edge of the Bay Resort, is spectacular, and just as I was about to crawl into bed for the first part of what proved to be 15 hours' sleep, I looked out and saw the tail of a wallabie move past one window. She (I think) hopped right up on my patio and stopped about 10 feet from the sliding glass door. I got several pictures with a joey peeking out of the pouch, and then just sat down at the door to watch -- and she hopped right over and spent the next five minutes staring at me through the glass. Many photos followed. Hopefully I can show them to you at some point.

Today, after sleeping in, I did quite a bit of hiking in Freycinet National Park, which it's boring to discuss without photos, and now I'm heading back to sleep a bit more. There's more, of course, but time is just about out and I've had all I can stand of this keyboard.