Melbourne - a day in the city

We were up early to catch a lift into Melbourne with Wayne, who was heading into work in the city. First stop was the Eureka Skydeck 88, the highest observation tower in the Southern Hemisphere. It was a beautiful clear day and the views were amazing. They also have something called the Edge, which is like a vertical elevator that moves out (with us in it) and has a clear glass floor. It also has some horrible cracking sound effects, so you think the whole thing's about to plummit.

We then headed over to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image to visit the Tim Burton exhibition. It was excellent and included items from 40 years of his work - paintings, drawings, puppets, costumes, props, storyboards and film. We watched his quite disturbing version of Hansel & Gretel that aired on TV in the 80's. What is interesting is that the first work he submitted to Disney was pretty generic, smacked of Dr Seuss (and they declined to use it) and just shows how he evolved his own style and how he frankly got much better. I think it would give anyone with any ambition to be an artist some hope. You can explore the exhibition here.

We then went to a trading card shop that Liam had looked up to buy some more of his Magic - the Gathering cards. He's really into it and is building and re-building his decks. He likes to win. So now in every town we have to visit the card shops.

After a late lunch (pancakes) we found a comic book/toy shop where we could have spent the rest of the afternoon - Vicky: they had an entire Twilight section :)

Having dragged ourselves away without buying anything, we walked over the Captain Cook's cottage. Yes unbelievably, the cottage in which he supposedly grew up in Great Ayton, Yorkshire, has found it's way to Melbourne (some say that he never lived in the house, but almost certainly visited his parents there). The owner sold it in 1933 for £800 and it was deconstructed brick by brick and transported to Australia. Cuttings of ivy that adorned the house were also taken and planted when the house was re-erected in Melbourne. The new owner donated the house to the people of Victoria for the centenary anniversary of the settlement of Melbourne in October 1934. It's absolutely tiny, has a little cottage garden and a rail of 18th Century clothes outside that you can use for photos. It's brilliant.

We went over to meet Wayne and got a lift back with him to the house. On the way we headed for the paddocks again to see if we could spot some kangaroos. No luck. We then headed out to their local Chinese restaurant where the owner, Jenny, really looked after us. It was the perfect end to a perfect day. There is a moral to this story: always speak to strangers you meet on a bus in Vietnam. Thank you Heathcotes!