Welcome to the A to Z challenge, a blog post everyday of April apart from Sundays, covering every letter of the alphabet. My theme is travel, that thing that we haven’t been able to do over the last 12 months, so it seemed appropriate to reminisce about past travels we’ve taken, looking forward to when we can travel freely again.

Today we’re looking at the thing I’m a bit obsessive about before a holiday, and one of the 105 places in the world that have the same name.

Before travelling anywhere I have to research where we’re going, local etiquette, best places to visit, what history and cultural things to see. I love a travel guide and even though information is now literally at our fingertips on the internet, I still buy physical travel guides to read up about the place. As you can see I quite like an Eyewitness Travel guide, and also a Lonely Planet guide. Some of the above books we bought before internet research was the big thing (can you remember what that was like?) but many are more recent – this is just a small selection of the travel related guides I have.

They’re great because they fit in my handbag, divide the city of choice into sections, and each section has a list of the best places to eat or shop as well as unfolding to show a map of that area and the top sites to see.

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So the Richmond that we’re visiting is very historic, but it’s not the capital of Virginia, or Richmond Royal Park on the river Thames, or the town in Jamaica, or the castle in Yorkshire, or any of the other 101 places (according to English Heritage) that have the name Richmond. No, this one is in the south of Tasmania and is a popular tourist stop on the convict trail, but also has wonderful local arts and crafts, galleries, and lovely places to eat.

Along with the old bridge, Richmond also has the oldest gaol in Australia and the oldest Catholic church in Australia that’s still standing and it’s still used.

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If you are at all interested in the convict history of Tasmania, then the gaol is definitely worth a visit. Ancestors on my fathers side of the family came to Australia as convicts, so I always wonder if they have been in any of these buildings and do my thing where I place my hand against the old stones in the buildings and try and absorb the history.

Thanks for stopping by and make sure you visit other bloggers who are crazy enough to be doing the challenge with me – Click Here to visit the master list of participants.

Stay safe and have a wonderful day.

Previous A to Z posts:

2018 – R is for Reality

2017 – R is for Random Highland Finds

2016 – R is for Romance