you never really know someone......

yup, I have discovered that you can never really know what is going on in people's lives. I already knew this, but found out first hand over the last couple of days.....

After my allergic reaction, and being given tuesday off as well has having wed/thur already off, I planned and headed out to St.Helens, east coast Tasmania. I hoped on a bus tuesday afternoon and arrived 2 1/2 hours later to the small hamlet of St. Helens, population of about 2000. I stayed at the YHA, a cute little house converted into a hostel.  I had pre-arranged with a tour guide to hopefully take a one day tour of all the sights/beaches/walks on the wednesday, however, I was the only one booked and he would not take just one person, and no one at the hostel was interested in going. Brent, one of the owners, suggested I talk to Trevor, a traveller staying for 6 nights. I originally asked if he wanted to take the tour with me, but he said no as he had his own rental car, but he would take me as long as I helped pay for petrol. I thought, yeah, sure, he's in his 50's, seems like a nice guy, and Brent suggest I talk to him. So Wednesday morning, I got up, had brekky, and we were off in his rental car to Binalong bay and the bay of fires - a world renowned beach. Not long after we left, I found out that he was an amateur photographer just like me, and so we got along great! He taugh me some things about taking photos, and I was never rushed to get to the next place! We sent to many beaches and sights that day, had lunch back at the hostel, then headed up to the northeast coast of Tasmania to see some more sights and take more photos. The weather was really intermittent and we had showers on and off all day, but we where lucky in that it always seems to poor when we where driving. He mentioned that he was going to go to St.Helen's point and take pictures of the sunset and I went with him. We got there quite early, so went for a short walk on this path, and we started talking. I already knew that he was divorced and had 2 kids, originally from the UK, but lived in Brisbane and has been in Australia for 30 some odd years. I also then found out that he has suffered from depression, as well as was diagnosed with bipolar a couple years ago, was found in Singapore in a psychotic state, spent a night in jail, as well as some time in a psyhc ward getting put on meds. I never felt scared or harmed, but I have to admit I did feel a wee bit uneasy when he was first telling me this.  I was somewhat relieved to be back at the hostel around other people!! 

The next day I was unsure whether I should go out with him again, but I decided that he was completely harmless and it was nice to have some company while traveling. I learned more about him that day, more about his personality and decided at the end of the day that that was enough.....thank goodness I was heading home the next morning!! He gets very passionate about politics and certain beliefs, and you could hear it in his voice when he talks about it. He hates the Americans. And I'm sure if I was American, he wouldn't have offered to take me out to see the sights. He also got very irritated when he was hungry, which I found very annoying. We stopped at this cafe that made cheese (the Holy Cow! Cafe) to have some lunch on Thursday, he ordered some soup and I ordered the burger. We unfortunately just arrived after a bunch of bikers had arrived, so we had to wait a bit. It was only about 10 minutes max that we waited and my burger came out first and he said to the waitress, "what, I order the soup and she gets her burger first??". He never said it in a rude or angry tone, but you could tell he was very irritated!! I was like, dude, take a chill pill!!!!

Anyways, it was a very interesting two days with him, and am glad I am home!!! He is going to mail me photoshop for mac because he doesn't use it, so I am very greatfull for that!! Below are some photos I took