30 November 2008 - Melbourne

23rd November

After a free breakfast, we put some washing on and had a walk down to the beach before getting a small amount of shopping and heading back. We left Phillip Island and drove to Melbourne, we ended up on a toll road and had to pay whopping $13 even though it was for a few mins….rip off. We stopped in the centre being a Sunday we didn’t have to pay for parking which was handy seeing as we had to fork out with the toll!! We found the information centre, stocked up on leaflets and got our questions answered then Sarah and Dan navigated us to the YHA which was just outside of the centre. Sarah joined the YHA so we got a discount on our room, they had rooms for 3 people so we got one of those for 3 nights, it was certainly a nice room with comfy beds!! Sarah was pleased as it gave her a brake from the hardness of her usual tent mattress.

24th November

We got up at 7am this morning as we wanted to make the most of our day. We had discussed the previous night where we wanted to go so after buying our tram tickets we headed straight to the aquarium. It wasn’t very big but they had a good range of tropical fish and corals, which im sure must be very difficult to keep, so it was impressive all the same and we all enjoyed it which was the main thing!

We had our sandwiches and walked to the free shuttle bus stop that takes you to all the sights around the city, we hopped on and jumped off at a park that housed Captain Cooks house. They had shipped the house from England and re-built it in this park, i have to say they did a very good job as you couldn’t tell that it had been taken apart and shipped thousands of miles across the ocean!!

In the same park was a café so we went I there for a hot drink, it was pretty cold out, considering it is supposed to be there summer the wind was bitterly cold and we all could have done wit a few extra layers!! The gardens here were really well kept and looked beautiful, you wouldn’t even know you were in the city whilst in them.

After our drinks we got back on the free bus and enjoyed the sights of the city, we did some window shopping then set about getting the tram back to the hostel.

Tonight we treated ourselves to a pizza from a shop just down the road, we hurried back with it and ate it in the room, it was delicious, we haven’t had pizza in a long time!! The rest of the evening was spent relaxing and planning for the following day.