At Sea en route to Tasmania
- At December 17, 2023
- By Jessica
- In Travel
0
Boy, these 1 hour time changes every few days are so confusing! Woke up today at 4 am, thinking it was 5, and our phones said 6. Phones won't adjust until and unless we turn on cellular.
But we made good use of the time:
Tomorrow we make landfall in Hobart, Tasmania. South of there is Antarctica where we are not going, at least not on this trip. Tasmania is, of course, home to the Tasmanian devil, a carnivorous marsupial. We are warned that if we are menstruating (an impossibility based on the average age of the females on this ship) to stay away from those little devils because they will attack at the scent of blood!
We always thought marsupials were unique to Australia and New Zealand but it turns out that marsupials started out from a common ancestor in South America, and one major branching-off took place long ago when South America, Antarctica and Australia were all connected to each other as part of a large landmass called Gondwana.
As we approach Hobart we are sentimentally reminded about how crazy our son was about TAZ (of Looney Tunes fame) when he was young. He even had a TAZ bowling ball.
Speaking of toons, according to our Viking Daily on this day in 1940 the first Tom & Jerry cartoon debuted on MGM. Now that's a cat and mouse game worth following. I wonder which one is the Republican?
Expect a full report and, hopefully, a photo of a real Tasmanian devil by end of day tomorrow.
