Remember yesterday I mentioned the Penguin Market and that it’s the biggest undercover market in all of Tasmania and how people apparently come from far and wide to shop there with its food court and live music and variety of stalls?  Well…… it was the saddest market I have ever seen.  No, that’s not entirely true, the saddest market I’ve ever seen is the one in Marine Terrace in Geraldton on a weekend which consists of 2 card tables with the lady selling her crocheted doily wares and next to her is the man who is selling about 4 potted plants.  But those two people aren’t touting themselves as the biggest and the best.  The locals here in Penguin however are very proud of their market.  Here is a sample conversation:

“Where are you off to this morning?”

“We’re going to check out the market.”

“Oh, yes. You must.  You must go to the market.  It’s fantastic.”

There were two more conversations just like it before we got there and it was only around the corner and two blocks up!

Let me take on you a pictorial journey of Penguin Market….

The outside looked promising

And I’ll admit that there were maybe 2 stalls that had interesting old stuff – which I love.

Although the old dolls were just creepy…..

There were also handmade dolls/figurines…..

And then there was all the macrame that you can handle – don’t get me wrong, I very much appreciate the time, energy and talent it takes to hand make things like this.

But this was my favourite stall….. the doorway was covered over with a sheet and this note was pinned to the middle of it.

It reads: “Sory (sic) start of bowls back next week”

There was a book shop with some ‘interesting’ reading material….. Jenny’s comment: “Who knew there was that much information about the subject to write a book that thick!”

There was a stall called “Get Knitted” which belonged to a very talented knitter with too much time on their hands

Way way too much time……

Thank goodness the coffee was good and here in Tasmania we’ve discovered that people are happy to serve you a piccolo latte.  It will be my go-to coffee from now on.  Let’s see if it catches on in Mandurah.

The much advertised food court and live music however left us desperately wanting.  The food court consisted of one stall of dubious looking “Thai food” and the other was some pieces of cake individually wrapped in glad wrap.  That was it.

I think this image pretty much sums up the general feeling.

So when we went back to our hotel later in the afternoon and the manager asked us:

“So? Did you go to the market?  Wasn’t it great?  Did you enjoy it?”

“um, yeah, um……. there weren’t many people there.  Maybe because it was such a lovely day, they were all out and about.”

“oh (disappointed face), well it’s a long weekend, so maybe they’ve all gone camping or something.”

“yep”