Port Arthur

Ok, so if Burnie was tough, Port Arthur was shoe leather. Port Arthur sits on a small part of land in the southeast corner of Tasmania, and is connected to the mainland of Tasmania by a 39’ narrow isthmus of land. So imagine this – Australia was England’s penal colony. Tasmania was Australia’s penal colony. Port Arthur was Tasmania’s penal colony. Filter that down, and you get the most hardened criminals from England and Australia staying at Port Arthur. Thus, it should come as no surprise that the biggest attraction in Port Arthur is – you guessed it – an old prison.

Unfortunately, due to the ship’s late arrival into Port Arthur, the ship couldn’t get its tenders into the water until after a two-hour delay. Then, after waiting for three hours to get on the tender, we realized that it would take 45 minutes on the tender to get to shore, we’d have about 45 minutes to look around, and then we would have to get back in a 2 hour line to get back on the ship.

So what did we do to pass time waiting for the tender? Well, Jenny finally tricked me into playing some games with her, and I realized why I hate playing games with her. As a competitive alpha male, I love competition, especially when it’s something I can win. However, there has yet to be a game invented that I don’t habitually lose to my wife at. She crushes me at everything. It wouldn’t bug me except she‘s such a good winner. No gloating, no trash-talking – just pure, unadulterated dominance. I hate it.

Ok, I lost the first round of chess. I blame the mood lighting in this dimly lit, nautically themed bar. We change locales to better my odds. Best two out of three goes into effect immediately upon my loss. Silly – I should have recognized the futility of this venture based on previous performance against Jenny. But, like a small child, I apparently needed to relearn this lesson.

Did I say she didn’t gloat? I must have been wrong, because she insisted I take this picture to prove to everyone that I had lost the second of two games. Like a habitually gambler, I figure I gotta double up to catch up – best three out of five is out of my mouth before the king even gets tipped over.

I hate chess.

Once they finally call our tender number we made our way to shore and checked out the old prison that is Port Arthur. Pretty neat architecture, but to be honest, living out my life in a Tasmanian prison is NOT how I’d want to go out.