There was NO extra suitcase!

Contrary to popular belief rumour, I did NOT have to bring an extra suitcase back from Tasmania - either for yarn or for shoes!

I might have had to unzip the expander on my suitcase though. And the expander on my mum's (much smaller) suitcase. Tasmania's got some good yarn stores!! And did I mention some superfabulous bloggy friends? Oh yes, I met the famed Tinkingbell and the gorgeous Ms 2Paw!

I thought I'd give myself some time away from my Mum so she didn't drive me completely nuts Mum some time alone with her friends so I hired a car and did a little road trip for a few days.

First stop was the Tasmanian Wool Centre (no, not Tinkingbell's house - although I think it probably is the REAL wool centre of Tasmania!) - the actual Tasmanian Wool Centre, at Ross.

It had a little wool museum, where you could touch lots of different fleeces, and lots of knitted garments (mostly machine knits, but some baby and toddler handknits), other touristy stuff, and some yarn - real live actual Tasmanian yarn! Mr Rudd would be proud of my purchases - doing my civic duty to spend spend spend and support the local economy!

The fawn and brown yarn is the softest 8ply/DK yarn, from the east coast - big big skeins. The green labelled yarn is natural alpaca from Classic Park Alpaca Stud and the white balls are English Leicester - grown in Tasmania too (Wansted Park)! It's not quite as soft as the other, but I've never knit with it before so thought I'd give it a whirl!

(oh, and Ross is a lovely little town - well worth a stopover and a poke around the shops and the old bakery, which is about 150 years old, as well as the Wool Centre).

Next stop was Tinkingbell's! For some unknown reason, I didn't take any pictures there (sorry voyeurs!). I did have the full tour though, including all (I think...) the stash hidey holes and the view from the turret! Wow! And some of you think I have a lot of yarn. I'm a mere novice compared to superstasher Tink!! I had two nights with Tink and her family (her kids really took to me, which was lovely), including some imbibing of alcohol, some eating, some book reading (to the kids), some knitting, and yes, some yarn shopping - a very nice little yarn store on the main street in Ulverstone yielded this:

And to come entirely clean - I bought a whole bag of the Tango, not just these 3 balls...

Before the kids could tire of me, I headed back to Richmond, via Launceston where I met Ms 2Paw along with DarksideKnitter and her mum. We had a great time knitting (well duh!) and having tea and scones (well, that was me anyway ...). And then Ms 2Paw took me the LYS, Knits Needles and Woo (the "l" came off the sign - heh!). Where I picked up these:

Another ball of the elusive red Patonyle, and 3mm and 3.25mm KnitPicks tips! The ladies in the store were just unpacking them when we arrived!

Oh, and I mustn't forget, Ms 2Paw gave me presents! Fabulous things! A RoseRed sock project bag and a zippy case as well, plus gorgeously soft red yarn, Tasmanian fudge and a little Tassie devil phone charm (see, more Tasmanian wildlife!). Such lovely bags, I've been using the sock bag for my Cauchy socks, and the zippy bag for the small stuff I can never find in my handbag (now I can!!)

Our hosts in Richmond took us to Salamanca markets. While there were a few stalls with knitted hats and scarves, none had yarn, which was disappointing, although not surprising. But fortunately I sniffed out two yarn stores at Salamanca, in the permanent shops there. The Tasmanian Woollen Co sells fantastic garments (both machine and handknitted) and an eclectic range of yarn - it didn't seem to have a large range but had some very nice stuff...including this, which I'd not come across before:

Bamboo sock yarn called Happy! 75/25 bamboo/nylon - I can't wait to knit this up and see how it goes as socks! I was indeed most happy when I saw this!

And right next door is a wee shop called The Spindle Inn, a co-op selling yarn, fibre, handknits and the like. Including handdyed sock yarn! Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee! So hard to choose, but this is what I came away with:

All in all, a most successful visit in terms of yarn and in particular, bloggy friend meetups! Making friends (and actually meeting some of them in real life) through this blog has been one of the most unexpected, but wonderful, things that blogging has brought me!

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Oh, and for those who asked, the orange shoes are from Nu by Neo, and the style name is "Grab"! An entirely appropriate name, I think!