Our last day in Melbourne was a bit of a rush, since we were being picked up to go to the airport at 11am!
So we started the day with a delicious breakfast at Edelweiss Cafe
Janet had bacon and eggs, with lovely thick toast
and I had the Vegetarian Breakfast - which had mushrooms, hash brown, baked beans, tomato and toast!
Then we went for a walk around town - We stopped to take some photos of all of the grafitti in Union Lane -
And then we headed back to the hotel to wait for the shuttle bus. and headed for the airport. We had to wait in a long line to check in, and then we had to wait for a long time at the gate - we used up some time by removing some of the 27 layers of clothes we had been wearing so that our carry on luggage was correct weight :-) Since we knew there would be no food to buy on the plane (except pringles) we grabbed some lunch from the airport.
this vegie pizza was the only vegetarian thing I could find. Even the sandwiches all contained meat.
breakfast was a couple of croissants from "Pie Face" which we had purchased the night before. I tried to heat them up by snuggling them close to the boiling kettle in our hotel room. fail. Still, yummy enough croissants! We were being picked up by Wild Life Tours Australia for a one day tour of the Great Ocean Road!
first stop was the famous Bells Beach
I saw my first ever "wild" Koala. In that we saw Koalas that were in trees, not in zoos!
We had lunch (included in the tour) at Apollo Bay. Hanet had the Roast Chicken, Chips and I ate her salad :-)
I had a Vegie Burger.
We had about half an hour after lunch to have a wander around. We found ourselves at this ice cream shop :-)
It was delicious icecream! Janet had honeycomb, I had Dulce de Leche Gelato. mmmmmmmmm
We ate our ice cream whilst walking out to see the view of Apollo Bay.Then it was back onto our little bus.
next stop was Maits Rest Rainforest Walk
Then on to the twelve apostles.....
......Loch Ard Gorge
........London Bridge. All amazing sights to see (and a million more of my photos can be found here!!
on the way back to the city, we stopped at the Noodle Canteen at Colac for dinner
lemongrass & chilli vegie noodles
We started our day with a bit of breakfast from McDonalds.
mmmmm pancakes!
Janet had a bacon & egg roll
Then we caught a tram to the Melbourne Zoo. We were a bit early, so we had to wander around aimessly for a while waiting for it to open! The zoo was the place I really wanted to go to while we were in Melbourne. And I took about a million photos, so will share just a few here...
Meer Cat
Gorilla! - We stood and wached the gorillas for ages - they were enjoying a feed of spinach!
We also got to see the baby elephant!!
And of course, my favourite - Giraffes! Janet told me that they didn't have giraffes at this zoo, so I was very excited to see that they actually did!!
Lion
Brown Bear
After the zoo, we hopped back on the tram, and jumped off at the Queen Victoria Markets for a quick look around.
we managed to squeeze in time for some lunch
yes, we ate churros for lunch. We shared a bag of 7. for $6. delicious! Although I did get rather covered in icing sugar!
We then headed for Federation Square, because we had tickets for a very important event.
This is the whole reason we were in Melbourne!!
The Abba World exhibition was really good! They had heaps of the actual costumes, instuments and other ABBA memorabillia, as well as interactive sections where you got to sing with ABBA, dance in a video clip etc etc. We had a great time!
Of course, all that ABBA-ing makes you hungry, so we went over the road to "Lord of the Fries" for some dinner!!
how exciting! a vegetarian burger place!!! I want one in Brisbane!! please!!!
JAnet had the French-Canadian Fries, or Poutine, which was fries with cheese and gravy
I went for an original burger, which was fantastic! loved it!! the burger patty was delicious, the sauces, the pickle, everything was just as a burger should be!
And after all that healthy eating (just as well we also did A LOT of walking) it was back to our hotel for some sleep!
We went for a quick trip to Melbourne - we flew down with Tiger Airways, which had bargain priced tickets - it just meant waiting around at the airport for a rather long time after checking in. Our plane left a bit later that scheduled, which meant we arrived in Melbourne a little late for the bus we had booked to take us to the hotel. So as soon as we walked across the tarmac and out onto the footpath (yes, we never actually set foot inside the Melbourne Airport), the bus company was on the phone asking us where we were. We did make it onto the bus, so all was good! (We weren't the last ones on either!)
After we checked into the hotel, we popped back out to find some dinner. It was almost 10pm, on a Thursday night. We ended up finding this place situated quite nearby, opposite a Hungry Jacks and a Nandos (which was about to hit closing time). We asked the lady inside when they closed and she said midnight, so in we went to Cafe Tono
We were the only customers, and they were in the process of mopping the floor. We ordered our food, and watched as it was created behind the counter. The pasta sauce was freshly made for my spaghetti napolitana - the chef was whizzing up tomatoes and things with a stick blender right in the frying pan. We watched the pizza being created, and as it cooked, the pizza chef was busy prepping more dough for future pizzas - he was making perfectly portioned balls of dough.
I was presented with a humungous plate of spaghetti. Spaghetti Napolitana is one of my most favourite meals, and I am often disapointed, because the sauce doesn't live up to my expectaions (basically, I want something better than I can make myself!). This time there was no disapointment - it was delicious! I only wish I had been able to eat the whole plate - but the large serve defeated me about 2 thirds of the way through.
Janet's meat lovers pizza was also a hit - the base tasted deliciously fresh, and it had a good amount of meat and sauce. I was half wishing I had ordered a pizza, until I tasted my pasta!
Then it was back to our hotel for some sleep in readiness for the next day. (thats not our hotel in the picture - its just some pretty lights we saw on our wander)
