Time in Australia

Wow – it has only been three days since our last posting and so much has been seen/done.

Saturday. Saturday was a packed day seeing the sights of Melbourne. After posting our last blog from McDonald's which, all but for the free wi-fi we would otherwise avoid, we headed over to Queen Victoria's Market – a dream for Keith. Queen Victoria's Market is a HUGE market – a cook's dream – selling fresh meats, cheeses, wines, fruits and vegetables. There also is a huge flea market. It's sort of like Quincy Market in Boston on steroids. Best of all, the prices were a bargain compared to the prices in the markets in downtown Melbourne. In general, things in Australia seem pretty expensive (much to my horror, a diet coke goes for around AU$3.70 which ends up being about US$3.00). After Queen Victoria's Market, Keith and I took a river cruise up the Yarra River which run right through the middle of Melbourne. The river cruise dropped us off in a small historic town called Williamstown where Keith and I had lunch. After returning from the river cruise, I gave Keith the option of going to the Crown Casino (by far the largest one in Melbourne) or walking through the Botanical Gardens. Needless to say, Keith and I decided to spend a little time “doing our own thing.” Saturday night we headed back to the Crown Casino and tried our luck again. All and all we ended up leaving with a profit (though small).

Sunday. Though we had hoped to head to Tasmania after Melbourne, due to (we think) a huge soccer tournament, financially it just wasn't in the cards (though we are hoping to head there at some point in time before returning home). So we decided to focus on planning the next leg of our journey – driving from Melbourne to Adelaide. Renting a car proved to be quite the task. First we went to Hertz which told us it would be $500 for three days. At Europcar we had a little more luck as the young lady at the counter took a bit of a shining to Keith and told us that it would cost us around $210 to rent the car but that there would be an additional charge of $300 for renting the car one-way. Fortunately she also told us that if we got a youth hostel card, the $300 charge would be waived. So we needed to try and get the youth hostel card, though the place was closed until Monday. Neither of us (of course) wanted to have to pay the extra $300 – Keith was convinced that we weren't going to be able to get one. I was just kicking myself for not signing up for one before we left. Until Monday, there was nothing we could do. So we headed over to the National Gallery of Victoria where they were having an exhibit by Salvadore Dali. The exhibit was interesting though a bit overcrowded. After the Gallery we hopped on the tram and headed out to a picturesque little beach town called St. Kilda where we walked out the long pier, which provided a beautiful view of the Melbourne skyline, and along the boardwalk. For our last night in Melbourne we met up with some friends of friends. One of our friends Scott from back home had put us in contact with his friend who lived in Melbourne named Mike. Once again Keith and I hopped on the tram and headed out to meet Mike and his girlfriend Kate in an area of Melbourne called Fitzroy. Fitzroy is about 15 minutes by tram outside of downtown Melbourne which has a very “lower east side” of Manhattan feel. We had a fabulous evening with Mike and Kate, hitting a number of pubs, having a number of pints and having a yummy dinner. We hope to meet up with them again if we head back to Melbourne.

Monday. After a delicious breakfast in one of the little lane ways in Melbourne, we headed over to the youth hostel office. Much to Keith's surprise and my relief we were able to get a youth hostel card. Back to Europcar we went and after Keith managed to talk a different young lady into a free upgrade, we were on our way. In Australia they drive on the left side of the road but the steering wheel is on the right side of the car. Keith seemed to get the hang of driving here very quickly though we still constantly go to the “wrong” side of the car to get in. We were off to drive the Great Ocean Road. We spent much of the day driving along the Great Ocean Road which puts the Pacific Coast Highway to shame. With the ocean on one side and a rain forest on the other, it truly provided some of the most breathtaking sights either of us have ever seen. The only downside was the windy narrow road that would go up and down the sides of mountains which after a few hours of driving left my stomach a bit queasy. We stopped and saw the Twelve Apostles, the highlight of the Great Ocean Road, which are a series of 12 lime stone rock formations which originally were attached to the mainland but were separated by high winds and pounding seas. After many hours of driving, we hit a town called Warrnambool where we spent the night in our first hostel (which proved to be not quite as bad as Keith had anticipated).

Tuesday. We were up bright and early and headed over to one of the beaches in Warrnambool called Logan Beach where the southern right whales come to give birth to their calves every May to September before heading down to Antarctica. Since we were there so early, we had the beach to ourselves and we were able to watch the whales breach the top of the ocean (about 50 ft from shore) and the see the seals play in the waves. Then we were on the road again for the rest of the long (and not so exciting drive to Adelaide). The drive from Warrnambool to Adelaide was approximately 600 km (1 km = 0.62 miles). Though there really wasn't much to stop and do, it was still picturesque as we past by 600 km of nothing but farmland with many many many grazing sheep and cows and a few wine vineyards. More on our time in Adelaide tomorrow...