Melbourne

It was a sunny early evening when we arrived at Melbourne International airport, to be met by our friends Tash and Scott who we spent some time with in Buenos Aires back in late September. They had kindly offered to put us up in their newly acquired South Yarra flat, and although we'd only intended on staying for a couple of nights, they had insisted that we use their place as our base for the entirety of our stay.

After a good nights sleep, we were driven over to Victoria Markets, a large undercover area selling all manner of wares, from clothes and souvenirs, to fruit, vegetables and the main reason for our visit: fresh meat. The plan was to buy an assortment of meats from one of the many butchers and spend the afternoon using one of the free barbeque facilities scattered along the nearby Yarra riverbank.

The concept of people randomly turning up at a public area and taking advantage of the free cooking areas without squabbling was a little beyond our comprehension, but we found it to be a very pleasant afternoon with some outstanding scenes of sickly amiability. Where were the uncomfortable displays of self-importance? It was disappointing not to see a single show of 'barbie-rage' all afternoon. We will be writing to the British government as a matter of urgency to suggest a similar venture for the banks of Erith and Thamesmead's waterside areas, perhaps sponsored by Morrison's? Following a few riverside afternoon beverages, that evening we went for drinks in the city centre and met a few our hosts friends who were out celebrating a birthday.

Despite the heavy and late night, we were all up early for a drive down to the Healesville and its popular sanctuary, where for 70 years, this huge bush park has played a leading role in the care and protection of Australian wildlife. First stop was the reptile house, where one of the resident experts manhandled a number of dangerous snakes and gave sound advice on what to do in the event of a bite. We were surprisingly all ears.

Next, we stopped in at the Birds of Prey show, where four different species flew within a whisker of the crowds (Sarah and her strange 'bird fear' loved that part) and showed off their distinct hunting techniques. This was followed by some old fella who ran around unsuccessfully throwing boomerangs and generally teasing the kids. It was then off for a quick tour of the park on foot to see the Kangaroo's sleeping, large Koala's getting stoned on their daily eucalyptus intake, and a platypus swimming manically in constant circles. All entertaining stuff, and something we were grateful to be taken to see.

With Scott back at work the following day and Tash doing some serious job-hunting, we took ourselves off for the day. With over three million people residing in Melbourne's many suburbs, and a vast array of neighbourhoods to visit we knew we'd have our work cut out for us. A mixture of Victorian-era architecture and cutting edge futuristic developments, with lumbering trams running their courses back and forth around the city, the sleepy pace of the site for our
first foray into Australian life was almost ideal.

A gentle stroll alongside the Yarra river towards the ever-nearing City skyline brings you past the splendidly gothic looking Flinders Street station and by contrast the newly installed Federation Square with it's modern array of trendy cafe's and museum spaces.

To get our bearings we jumped onto the free City Circle Tram, passing a few of the government buildings at the eastern end of the city centre before alighting at the Old Melbourne Gaol. This 19th Century prison was home to some of Australia's most renowned bad-boys and naughty-girls from the crime-laden Gold Rush era of the 1850's, including the infamous Ned Kelly who was hanged here along with 136 others in the prison's eighty year existence.

Life here was tough, with prisoners kept in permanant solitary confinement; the use of 'silence hoods' forbidding anyone to talk with or recognise any of their fellow inmates; murderer's and gangsters living under the same roof as vagrants and bankrupts. This wasn't really a tour we'd intended on taking but turned into quite an interesting site, with very striking imagery of a time not so long past. We spent the rest of our day looking around the harbour area and the bustling city streets.

A day of labourious, but required events, like getting washing done and booking onward travel intervened before we walked the Yarra back into the City yet again, and a moving image exhibition that had taken my eye on our previous visit. Once my only slightly willing companion had reached her optimum boredom level and the fidgeting began, I gave up watching some quite interesting student animations and short films, and we made our way to Chapel Street to continue with the all-important quest to find some nice 'going-out tops' for Sarah. With Christmas in Sydney fast approaching, this was a do-or-die requirement, and the aforementioned area with it's mixture of trendy boutiques and, more importantly, budget-style shops was ideal. With our mission accomplished in just under two hours of shopping we stopped for dinner in a reasonable street-side restaurant and pulled in for a quick pint or two in the nearby pub.

For our final day in 'Melbers' we took a stroll through the nearby Botanic Gardens, crossing the impressive Shrine of Rememberance, a memorial built in honour of the Victorian's killed in World War Two, on our way to the Crown Complex, a large hotel and shopping site containing a huge casino.

We'd already seen that gambling is a big part of Aussie culture, with betting shops on every street corner, but this place really took the biscuit. It was only 2pm, but the whole floor was packed with enthusiastic punters throwing their cash at the large array of 'Pokie' machines and Roulette and Black Jack tables. The seedy lower-level Poker floor was quite interesting and Sarah had to drag me away to prevent me from having a little flutter. This however, was a bit of a detour on our part, when we were really here to see what was supposed to be a spectacular Christmas display, but turned out to be a slightly over-billed automated light and sound show.

That evening we suggested a night out in St Kilda, as we'd heard this is where all of the backpackers generally stay, and this would be the most likely place to see some live music. After a quick stroll around the night market, we settled in at 'The Espy', a cool yet grand looking hotel bar. A band were in attendance, but due to the stifling heat we decided to retreat to the relative coolness of the garden to put away a few jugs of VB. This would have to be an area to revisit on our way back through our upcoming journey via the south coast.

Melbourne is definitely an entertaining and culturally diverse city, with lots to offer all manner of tourist whatever their taste. As per usual, we probably didn't get to see everything but with a return visit in mind we knew all was not lost and we felt we'd had a pretty good crack at it. Staying at our friends was a money-saving luxury we were very grateful for, although fully aware we can't have it both ways, did feel that we missed out on the backpacker scene a little. For now, we were off to Melbourne's arch rival city, and although we weren't massively looking forward to the twelve-hour Greyhound coach journey, we were excited once again to be meeting up with a few of our travelling buddies from our journey so far, and some good friends from home over the christmas period.

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