Melbourne 2nd trip - Kirsty

Well it's been another action packed 5 day galavant to Melbourne for me. I shall shortly fill you in on my happenings and will try and get the nature facts right (in Marie's absence I decided to take notes!). Let's start off this post with a nature joke (this one's especially for you Grandad). What do you call a sheep crossed with a kangaroo? A woolly jumper! Haha. Maybe I should steer clear of blogging nature and comedy in future.


I took the short 1.5 hour flight from Sydney to Melbourne on Wednesday evening and stayed with my friends on the Southbank area of Melbourne again. It's such a great location and I enjoyed spending time with them and going for drinks of an evening. The main reason for my trip was the Formula One Grand Prix but I decided to sandwich the racing weekend with a Thursday day trip to Phillip Island and a Monday trip to the Great Ocean Road. I booked with two different tour companies, both of which were excellent.
I was joined on the Friday trip to Phillip Island by Nicola and we were picked up late morning in the city and driven out to Port Phillip bay. We had a stop off at a sanctuary where we could feed the docile wallabies and kangaroos. Phillip island itself reminded me of the Isle of Wight in terms of size, and perhaps because there was a main town called Ventnor. But it's just a short bridge crossing from the mainland to the island. The island is teeming with wildlife- grey geese indigenous to the island, hundreds of wild wallabies and kangaroos. And of course the main attraction... penguins. In order to avoid predators the penguins only appear onto the beaches once it's dark so we had a few hours to kill. We enjoyed viewing spots and board walks along the rugged coastline. We also had afternoon tea by 'swan lake' where we thought it would be funny to take ballet pose photos.... Let's just say out tourguide and fellow tourists were less amused. Hundreds of species of birds and butterflies were also to be seen. 

The sun was due to set around 8pm so we were dropped off for the penguin parade around 7.30. Due to it being dark and the flash scaring the penguins, there is a strict no photography rule, which was actually really nice as we watched and enjoyed the experience like a live movie. No kidding we had little cushions to sit on on our bench seats in the stand on the beach and many people had brought popcorn for the show. Bang on 8.06 the first few penguins began to appear. 

As the waves washed them onto the beach they waited for a group then toddled off across the beach onto the dunes to find their burrows. It's a truly magical and endearing show and literally thousands appeared over the next few hours. We followed them onto the island on the visitor centre walkway and at times were barely a metre away. The 'little penguins' are only found on the southern east coast of Australia. They are a maximum of 33cm tall and can live in the ocean for up to a month before they must return to land for food. We saw a few fluffy baby penguins too calling to their mummas. By chance I had watched march of the penguins the day before I flew to Melbourne and was reminded of their monogomous nature. They find a mate and stick with them. Unlike the male seals who apparently have a harem of 15 lady friends at a time. 
For such little creatures they make an awful lot of noise and we enjoyed watching the larger penguin stand on the corner ushering all the other penguins up the path towards the burrows. Like most other penguins they are 2 colours. Blue/black on their backs so when they are swimming they blend with the blue of the water to the predator birds that maybe hungry. Underneath they are white to camouflage with the water reflection to stay hidden from penguin eating creatures that lurk beneath.  It really was one of the most memorable natural shows on earth. Live David Attenborough. I'd recommend the penguin parade to any Melbourne visitors.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday I headed down to Albert park for the Grand Prix. This race was the first of the season so I had to do a bit of reading up on the changes and new rules. Each day the weather improved and each day the festival atmosphere grew. Apparently 80 000 came through the gates for qualifying on Sat and 120000 on Sunday. For practices and qualifying I managed to position myself next to the fence on turn 11 and enjoyed watching them zoom past with ear plugs in situ. The noise is immense, the smell of rubber unique and generally a once in a lifetime experience. For those of you who don't follow f1, the Brits did best in qualifying and delivered the goods on Sunday with a Button win. Due to the crowds I didn't get as close for the race itself, but enjoyed it more watching one of the trackside large screens. The site had many other attractions including regular shows from the Aussie red arrows, a motocross stunt show on Sunday eve and many live music venues. Vintage car shows and fair ground rides added to the festival atmosphere. After the race they allow spectators to walk the track which is usually a Hyde park esque attraction with a boating lake and golf course. It's transformed for the annual GP weekend and makes for an impressive setting with city skyscraper backdrop and glistening lake. 


For Monday I booked myself on another organised tour of the Great Ocean Road. It follows the southern ocean and was a glorious day for seeing the sights and beaches. This was the first time I'd done a tour by myself but quickly made friends with an English couple visiting their grandchildren and another fellow English traveller. The tour in total covered 600 km and lasted 14 hours.  It was an early start of 8am and we headed south west out the city to pick up the Great Ocean Road. Our very informative and comical tour guide filled us in with the facts and stories as we drove. Melbourne is a relatively new city, formerly called Batmania and created in 1835. By 1880 it was the fastest growing city in he world and today boasts a population of 4.2 million. In 10 years with the current rate of growth it is due to overtake Sydney.  Once out the city we stopped for morning tea at Serendip sanctuary conservation area where there were hundreds of wild kangaroos (collective noun is a mob). Apparently the kangaroo population has doubled in size since European settlement and they live in abundance now. Hence the yearly cull and regular apprearance on the 'burger' section of many restaurant menus. They certainly have a spring in their step and can easily clear a 6 foot fence. They can hop at 55km/h, 5 kmph faster than an emu. I have to say I've not warmed to the emu. Odd, scary looking birds I wouldn't want to cross paths with one that's for sure. 


We stopped off at Bells beach briefly but it's currently being set up for a world surf tournament. By chance we stopped at public toilets and witnessed a most unusual exchange between a koala and cockatoo over a eucalyptus tree. Considering koalas sleep 17-20 hours a day I'm guessing Mr Koala was pretty cheesed off to be awoken by a chirpy cockatoo screeching at him (rather like Marie being woken for a sunrise by a chirpy morning person like myself.... Hehe). See the photo I took in the next post and I'm going to open up the floor for a caption competition. After this most extraordinary encounter we continued our Koala viewing at a caravan park which is home to more koalas and parrots. Once again we were in the right place at the right time as we watched a wild koala climb down, cross the path and climb up a different eucalyptus tree to continue his snoozing. We rejoined the road and we passed the sign and memorial signifying the official start to the Great Ocean Road. This road took 23 years to build and was mainly built by ex soldiers returning from war. It is dedicated to honour those who fought in the great wars and thus probably stands as the largest war memorial in the world! We went past the lighthouse from the filming of 'round the twist' (which the tourguide apologised for exporting to British kids tv, those of you my age will remember it featured on CBBC, truly awful). We stopped for lunch at a Greek restaurant in Apollo Bay before continuing along to the major sights. 

The 12 apostles is probably the most famous view from the Great Ocean Road. As the harsh storms and wind erode edges of the cliffs, parts break away, forming stand alone rock formations in the sea. There are, however, only 8 and the last one disintegrated in 2004. In fact, I don't think there ever were 12, but once named the apostles, 12 seemed to be the appropriate number title. New apostles are continually being formed and no doubt the ever changing coastline will take a different form should you visit in 100 years' time.  We went on to visit Loch Ard gorge and London bridge. London bridge met the same fate as the last apostle in 1990 and part of it collapsed. So today it's less of a bridge and more of an arch. But the views are nonetheless spectacular. After a 3 hour drive back to the city an exhausted Dora took grateful refuge once more on James and Wendi's sofa bed and headed back to Sydney the next day. With only 6 weeks or so left in Australia I'm trying to plan final trips. I am eagerly awaiting the arrival of my cousin Simon from Vietnam and great friend Cath from the UK at Easter. So as they say, that's it for now.... To be continued.....