Everyone knows I love obscure museums. So after leaving the white sand beaches of Bicheno, where 11 penguins walked right past me last night, I could not resist a sign that read "Cranks and Tinkerers Museum." I mean, who could? I broke all road trip rules and made a u-turn and wandered into the old train depot at St. Mary's.
I was welcomed by Ian, whose evergrowing project this is. He has banjos and gramophones and Brownie cameras and scale models of the Hindenberg.
The grammophone is in front of the toy train set.
Lots of scale models of fighter planes and ships. He was assembling at least one ship in tiny, accurate detail.
Nothing makes me feel more at home than a projector.
The highlight was getting to hear Ian play the small air organ and the windup gramophone.
The Brownies are before my time, but the Polaroids and Kodaks definitely are not.
Gramophone
A more modern turntable with tennis racks, from my era.
Ian said that these shoes were found hundreds of years later, inside the walls of a building, for good luck.
I set my GPS for the Tasmanian cheese store. It was another 90 minutes drive. Before I left, I asked Ian to recommend any interesting towns along the way, and he suggested on right off the highway. I followed signs somewhat accidentally to the Woolmers Estate, and stumbled into Tasmania's Downtown Abbey. Really, all I wanted was cold water and a snack.
Fortunately that included the gardens. And the cars.
The Rose Gardens are gorgeous, even if it was suddenly sweltering. The interiors are too, but we weren't allowed to take photos.
It was quite a good stop, if you don't mind unrepentant colonialism.
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An hour plus later and I am at Ann's wildlife sanctuary, where I was greeted by 5 chihuahuas and a wallaby joey.
There's a miniature horse named Elmo and a baby wallaby named Billy. And a couple of very friendly pademelons like Becks.
More to come tomorrow. The moral of the story is not to fear the detour.
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