City by the Sea

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Hi Everyone,

Greetings from the Blue Mountains! This entry is coming hot on the heels of the last one because the blog is still over a week behind. We left the last entry with us touching down in Melbourne...

We had a great four days in Melbourne, eventually. When we landed in Australia we realised how little of the trip we actually had planned, in fact we had a three week gap in our diary before we knew we were flying from Cairnes to Ayers Rock. With this in mind it took a lot of time in the first few days booking accomodation/transport etc and working out which places we had to drop from our wish list because time would be against us. You'll read the result of this planning in the coming weeks.

We stayed at a place called the YHA Oasis, probably one of the nicest hostels we've stayed in and a welcome rest-bite after the pretty dodgy run of places we'd been at towards the end of our stay in New Zealand.

After spending a great deal of time travel planning, we rounded off our first full day by getting the tram out of the town centre to St Kilda, the suburb of Melbourne that's also got a beach. Unfortunately we were totally overdressed in the scorching weather and after a quick drink (and more planning) we returned to the city in time for sundown, followed by a walk up to the area near our hostel and a nice pizza.

The next day was more successful. After a final bout of travel booking we had a proper explore of the city and it was good to be in a place that had a real city vibe and life about it after the let down of Auckland. With staying at the hostel we got free tickets to the aquatic centre so in the afternoon we went to do some proper exercise to counterbalance all of the eating out we we'd been doing.

One of the highlights of the stay was the Neighbours tour which we took the following day. We both watched Neighbours when we were younger but hadn't watched it for around 10 years so we felt a bit like outcasts as the commentator on the bus told us stories about what had happended to characters we'd never heard of. The commentator herself seemed a bit jaded - as if bussing around British tourists for years had made her despise her work. We weren't sure she even liked Neighbours any more.

Anyway, we got to see where they film the school scenes in the soap opera and visited the studio where we got to ask questions to one of the current cast members (I asked whether he could sing. He said he could.), the actor then posed for photos and signed autographs before we headed off to the fictional Ramsay St where all the "action" takes place. We were actually really lucky to see them filming right at the end of the street where we were allowed to stand. So in about 12 weeks time look for a girl sitting on a pavement crying with some love letters in her hand (I assume they were love letters, they could have been exam results, or a council tax bill). After that it was back to the city and on to Federation square where we watched another beautiful sunset and enjoyed an excellent meal in a little Italian place.

Our final full day was packed. We lugged our bags to Melbourne train station before lunch then headed up to Melbourne Museum. The museum was first class with great exhibits on Australian wildlife (we needed to know which spiders were poisonous), the human mind and the stars. We'd set aside a few hours and they flew by. We then went back to the nearby aquatic centre to cool off on what was another hot afternoon. A sauna, swim and noodle meal later we were back at the station ready for the overnight train to Sydney.

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Photos

Melbourne Oasis YHA
An excellent base for exploring the city

Outside Melbourne Museum
They finally realised Mega Rubiks Cube was never going to be a big seller this Christmas.

Royal Exhibition Building
It's now a World Heritage Site

On Our Way to Ramsay Street
Apparently this guy currently stars in Neighbours, but frankly we wouldn't know if he did or not.

About to Start Filming
as Pin Oak Crescent becomes Ramsay Street

After experiencing a Melbourne Museum Exhibition
All he needed now for the Elton John theme party was a hair transplant.