Animal Farm

Manda writes:

We had held off leaving Hobart these past few days to go to the Salamanca Market, which takes place every Saturday. The market did not disappoint and was well worth the wait. It was very busy as this weekend is a long one for the Aussies - it's the Queen's birthday, a public holiday. The Tassie locals, along with a quotient of visitors, were out in force. It was difficult to move forwards at times and we had to manouevre as if we were dancing to get through the ever-oncoming crowd.

Although dry, it was a cold day and the smell of food and hot drinks were very alluring. These temptations were even harder to resist as we spotted shoppers walking around munching hungrily on their food. There was definitely no shortage of mobile food vans making the most of the footfall. While walking around, we picked up a hot dog, pastie, carrot cake and apples between us. Everyone was snacking so we didn't feel too bad!

The market itself is well worth a visit. Its merchandise includes the usual things on offer at markets but with a wider choice: hand-made craft, home-made confectionary and interesting collectables. Light entertainment, in the form of buskers dotted around the place, added to the cheery atmosphere.

Richmond Zoo Doo Wildlife Fun Park

Once we had exhausted all the aisles at Salamanca Market, it was time to head back to Ethel and to our next stop: Richmond Zoo Doo Wildlife Fun Park. We had picked up leaflets about this wildlife park and were interested in seeing the white Tamar Wallabies and the Tasmanian Devils, in particular.

[Ian adds: Their web site didn't make the place look very appealing, given it's circa 1998 design, but appearances can be deceptive! You guys need a web designer at all?]

As we pulled up into the car park, we could see a few pens of animals and thought that this wouldn't take long to cover. How wrong we were! We ended up spending four hours here.

The white (albino, actually) Tamar Wallabies were interesting to look at, although rather timid. As soon as you tried to walk over to feed one of them, it would scarper. I won't tell you how many attempts it took to take this photo but it was a fair few!

A shy albino Tamar Wallaby lets us get close enough to take a photo.

This was not the only unusually coloured animal in the park. We noticed a few of the rabbits and chickens, in the farmyard animals section, had flourescent colouring. "This cannot be natural!", we both exclaimed. It surely wasn't and the flourescent pink chook standing next to the flourescent yellow rabbit in the next pen had been coloured with food dye. Why? Well, we were told that their new looks were as a result of the Easter festivities. The dye has somehow lasted longer than expected - poor things. Still, safety in numbers.

The Tasmanian Devil made a surprise appearance too. This normally nocturnal creature was pacing around as if it were night-time. Probably a rough day's sleep for this little fella but we didn't have any complaints!

The Tasmanian Devil - nothing like the cartoon character of the same name.

For me, there were two main highlights to this park. The first one was the 'feeding the large animals' trip. This sounds like something geared towards young kids but before I go on, let me tell you that a few of the younger less-courageous visitors (and their parents) in our contingent left the truck before we got to the end!

It was highly comical and utter mayhem as our warden took us through the ostrich, emu, water buffalo, farmyard animals and camel enclosures to feed the frenzied bunch. To be honest, I'm not sure who was in more of a frenzy, the animals or the warden, as he lured these huge animals into the truck with a tub of food. The fact that the truck was full of people made it even more amusing as those closest to the slobbering animals tried to duck and dive out of saliva's way. The warden was not lying when he said that this was going to be 'a hands-on, neck-on, head-on and all-other-parts-on experience'!

Mayhem on the bus as the warden puts animal feed right in the middle seats, walking through the packed bus while the camels stick their heads through the open sides. Disclaimer: No humans were injured in the taking of this photo (but some clothes were mildly slobbered on).

Some of the huge animals just looked scary to the younger kids, others were just down right scary! The emus were one such type. As the truck pulled to a stop, so did the flock of emus who, up until this point, had been running frantically to keep up with us. We were all given paper bags full with feed that looked like a mixture of stale bread and sawdust. We were told, in a joking manner, that there'd be a $50 fine if we were caught littering. Then the feeding commenced ... these birds pecked so ferociously that the bags of food were ripped in seconds and dropped onto the floor. One of the emus had snatched my bag in one peck. I watched horrified as he emptied some of the feed down his throat. Then he gave up doing this the 'graceful' way and swallowed the whole bag in one gulp. We could see the bag work its way down its neck! The whole truck and most of the passengers were covered in bird feed as we left the emu enclosure.

An emu with a bag of food, just about to swallow it whole.

The second highlight was the indoor minature horse racing, mainly because I haven't seen any close-up before (ok, the pony I rode during my horse-riding lessons doesn't count!). We were given tickets, numbered 1 to 5, to represent the horses. As the whistle sounded, the horses were off, along with the fake monkey jockeys (soft toys) strapped onto their backs. Number 2, Cherry, was the winning horse and off I went to collect my winnings - a mini chocolate bar. Maybe I should have placed a bigger bet on her!

After feeding the last bits of food to the kangaroos, deer, birds, wallabies and basically, anything that wanted more food (not that any of these animals were hungry, having been fed all day), we took Ethel to a campsite and called it a day.