Melbourne, Australia

We docked last night and this morning it was immigration! Try to imagine all 900+ people having to get off the ship and go through immigration before anyone could get back on the ship!

Then it was off on my excursion while Dale went back onto the ship so he could watch the Super Bowl game which the ship kindly streamed for guests on the pool deck. The only trouble was that it was 96 degrees out today and under that glass roof it was HOT.

The bus took me on a long ride around this city of 5 million and I saw many homes and buildings with the “iron lace” or “cast iron filigree”, the signature decoration of Melbourne which has more of it than either Paris or New Orleans. It was brought as ballast on sailing ships in the 1800s as bars of pig iron.

In the mid 1800s when Australia’s gold rush was in progress Melbourne, with its half million people then, was one of the richest cities in the world and the many beautiful buildings from that time still grace the city mixed in with the very modern.

We drove on the track for their Formula 1 Grand Prix, the seating for which takes them 2 months to set up each year, and which begins soon. And then we visited the Shrine of Remembrance for the veterans of all of their wars. It was an impressive place and showed how very much they valued the sacrifices of those people. The wall of knitted and crocheted poppies was impressive as was the view from the top.

New Zealand and Australia both have a policy of noting who originally owned the land that they now occupy. It would be interesting to know how the Aboriginals feel about those notes though.

The Botanical Garden could have taken a day to see but we had an hour so I walked as far as I could and didn’t see but a very few flowers; it was a lovely park of trees, lawns and lakes. I did, however, spot a spider in his web who scampered into a leaf when I approached. At first I thought the leaf had caught in his web and so he appropriated it but then I saw several leaves nearby and when I investigated I found that the Leaf-curling spider, found throughout Australia, weaves a leaf into the center of his web for a hiding place.

Our ship was docked near a lovely beach where, since its summer and 96 degrees out, people were enjoying the water. Its not sunset yet tonight and it won’t be a nice one because there are no clouds but I thought its about time I showed you one since we see so many nice ones. You remember that I am not a very patient person, right?, so although this one got better I had already given up. I’ll try harder next time.