March 9, 2005

We enjoyed Melbourne a lot more today. We started out by going to see the temple out in East Melbourne in a suburb called North Watirna. It is a small temple but, of course beautiful. I want to try and photograph all of them that we can see in Australia. After we took the photo, we met a sweet old lady who needed a ride nearby. It was only five minutes by car but she would have had to walk a long way. It was a pleasure to help her and we got to know a little about her. She is a temple worker and is originally from England. It was a very nice start to our day.

Afterward, we drove to St. Kilda, a suburb south of the city center. On our way, we were able to go through the downtown, which was a real treat. We normally avoid downtown areas but we were glad to see Melbourne's. There are a lot of really neat buildings - new very modern ones right next to very old classic ones. The Flinders Street station is a really neat building, and Andy really liked the Victorian Arts Centre that looks a little like the Eiffel tower. Melbourne (and Australia in general) really tries to keep a lot of park areas for people. It really makes for nice cities when you walk or drive through and see lots of green spaces.

St. Kilda was also really neat. We went to lunch on Acland Street. This street was a little like Brunswick from yesterday, only we liked it better. The food was great and then we had some more gelato - yummy. At lunch, I had a rose-flavored lemonade, which was really good. It made me feel very royal and romantic. St. Kilda also has an amusement park right next to the beach, much like the boardwalk in Santa Cruz. The atmosphere in St. Kilda was just much nicer and more fun than Brunswick, we thought. Also, while we were here, Andy tried to secure some sports tickets, maybe for Adelaide or one of the upcoming cities. He had no luck, though. There’s something tomorrow in Melbourne but we’ll be long gone.

Once lunchtime was over, we headed out of Melbourne toward Geelong and the Great Ocean Road. The GOR, as you would suspect, runs along the ocean, the south coast, actually. This area looks a lot like the Pacific coast of the US. It's very beautiful. The highlight of our drive, so far, is that we got to see koalas in the wild. Some of them were sleeping in the swaying trees. Others were eating leaves. They were so sweet. Then, a short way away, we saw one eating from a small gum tree on the side of the road. We got some great pictures and video. The animals are my favorite part. We also saw some white cockatoos, which I have never seen in the wild either.

Tonight we are staying in a little town called Lavers Hill at another nice mom and pop motel. We met some other Americans travelling. They had been to India, Bali and Singapore. It was neat to talk to fellow travelers. Tomorrow we are going to finish the Great Ocean Road. There are supposed to be some really neat rock formations on the way. We are then headed for Cape Jervis where we'll take the ferry to Kangaroo Island. So far, a very successful trip.

Oh yeah, and ever since yesterday with the cockatoos at the Ned Kelly museum, Andy and I have been mimicking the bird's "hello" back and forth. We sound like a human and a bird. Andy's the human saying "hello" and then I echo back in a bird voice. "Hello!" It’s one of our inside jokes now.

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