Melbourne: Last But Certainly Not Least

I felt bad for Melbourne. How could it ever compete with the beauty and fun of everything that has gone before? Spectacular NZ and our Fellowship, the magnificence of Sydney, the dreamlike Hamilton Island. It seemed like our travel agent had blown the sequencing badly here. Upon arrival at the airport, we quickly learned that one of our four suitcases was lost (fortunately one of the ones with hardly anything in it), and the driver who arrived to pick us up had a smaller vehicle so we never could have fit the last bag anyway. After the sense of solitude and luxury in Hamilton Island, we arrived at the Next Hotel Melbourne expecting to re-enter the average world. And it did seem that way at first. While our room was perfectly adequate, even large for a hotel room, it was not well lit and our view was a high rise office building, so we had to keep the curtains closed. We immediately received a call from the airport as we checked in, letting us know they had found our missing bag and would deliver it that night, so that was good, and the young lady at the registration desk told us we had been upgraded to concierge so food and drink was available 24/7. Hopeful signs, all.

The plan for our next morning was to do a Lanes and Arcades Tour of Melbourne with a company called Hidden Secrets. It was cold and raining, but we gamely headed out on foot to our rendezvous in Federation Square. Melbourne is the second most popular city in Australia, next to Sydney, and gaining fast. Like NZ, it has a strong indigenous population, the Aboriginal Australians, and there is a concerted effort to support their heritage. In 1851, Melbourne experienced an event that characterizes the city even today, the discovery of gold. The population boomed as people arrived to seek their fortune, and the city became wealthy, was a major finance center and Australia’s first stock exchange. The architecture of the city is unique because of this rapid growth. It is characterized by numerous alleyways which had the original purpose of garbage and human waste collection to support the population boom. Now, though, these alleyways house a booming economy for shops, restaurants, and bars. Tables and chairs crowd open spaces, and the streets are filled with people shopping, eating, drinking and meeting friends. It is electric and exciting and everywhere you look there is something interesting. Our tour guides were great city historians, and our small group consisted of Bob and me, a couple from the Netherlands, an Asian family, and a few Australians. Melbourne is one of the world’s most harmonious and culturally diverse communities. People from 140 nations reside here and it shows in the food, the architecture, and the culture. There is an immediate feeling of being accepted. People are curious about each other, open to conversation, friendly and the locals very much wanted us to understand and appreciate their city. It is a great city to stay downtown and traverse on foot. We felt eminently safe and wandered without worry into alleys and side streets for the rest of the day. Our tour guides told us the best restaurants were in an alley on Flinders Lane, and as we passed ChinChin, a Thai restaurant considered one the best in the city, we decided to go there for dinner. We couldn’t get a reservation, but decided to pop in and take our chances, and were promptly seated at the bar. The food was excellent, the cocktails unique and unusual, the music was fantastic, and by the end of our first day in Melbourne, we knew it was another incredible find on our journey.

Next day, we had a tour planned to Phillip and French Island. This was a full day tour beginning with a bus ride (of course) to French Island. Our driver, Adam, was personable and efficient, and there were only six of us on the tour. Three were college guys who had elected to stop at a wildlife preserve. Bob and I traveled with Jiwon, an exchange student from South Korea, to the Island. As always, everyone spoke English, but it seemed everyone except Bob and I were bilingual. After dropping off the three guys, Adam took us to the ferry for our short ride to French Island.

French Island is an unincorporated National Park and a large coastal island of Victoria. There are about 110 residents on the island, and there are no public services, meaning that the families who live there have to provide their own power, sewer, water and any other community services that most of us take for granted. We met up with Scott, who drove us around in his vehicle, called OKA. OKA means business, and has to, as the island roads are not paved and often muddy and slick. French Islanders are serious environmentalists. Most of the locals farm cattle or sheep. At one point, the islanders planted and grew chicory and the land is dotted with chicory kilns. There is an abandoned prison farm at one end, owned now by the Chinese government, which had hoped to build a tourist industry there, but the islanders prevailed in keeping industry of any kind out. We visited the farm of Celia, who made us coffee, tea and some delicious cakes and quiche, and we had an hour to talk to her about her life. As we approached her farm, Scott stopped OKA and pointed out a pair of koalas in the trees. French Island is a safe space for koalas (most of which have chlamydia) and they are everywhere. Scott, who was for many years an environmentalist on the island, told us that the koalas are population controlled because they otherwise would consume all the eucalyptus trees and create their own destruction. They control the population by catching the females and implanting long term birth control. There are no foxes on the island, but there are snakes and birds of prey. There are feral cats and the islanders work endlessly to control that population as well. Celia maintains a horse farm along with her beef cattle, comprised of aging racehorses who would otherwise have been destroyed. Celia’s life is fascinating and we felt really lucky to have the opportunity to pick her brain. After we left Celia, Scott drove us around and we saw an Echidna, an egg laying mammal similar to the porcupine, who was wandering happily along the roadside. Bob fell in love with it and bought himself a miniature toy Echidna to carry around. Finally, Scott took us back to the ferry site, where we boarded the same ferry, but this time to Phillip Island.

Phillip Island is a resort area, and there were numerous people there. This was a little jarring after being so isolated on French Island. Having just come from Hamilton Island, Phillip Island would have a disappointment, but we were there to see the march of the penguins. Phillip Island Nature Park is a protected area for the Little Penguins, also called the fairy penguin. Each night at sunset, hundreds and thousands of these little birds emerge from the sea to their holes, bringing food back to their babies. They are about a foot tall and weigh only a few pounds. The Penguin Preserve on Phillip Island is dedicated to these little birds, and we were lucky to have ringside seats as they came on shore. It was freezing cold that night, and we shivered but watched in awe as they swam ashore in ‘rafts’ of 50 or more penguins, climbing anxiously from the water. The birds of prey know they are coming, but as dusk is generally the sleeping time for such birds, this is the best time for the penguins to make the dangerous trip ashore. They come in rafts as there is safety in numbers, and it was hilarious to watch as a few brave souls ran for a distance up the beach, then ran back to their raft, causing all the group to run back into the sea. This goes on for several minutes, until they all finally get their courage up, and then all run ashore in a big group. This group is then followed by the next and the next, each running in and out of the surf until they feel safe. We were not allowed to take pictures or film this. And of course, this is because of stupid humans. It seems that the flash of a camera causes the penguins to regurgitate on the beach the food they carry for their young. And no matter how often we humans are told to shut off the flash, it is never done with certainty. So having your camera out is forbidden and the park rangers are serious about this. But take my word for it—it is something to see. Penguins share parenting responsibilities so one parent stays with the kids while the other goes to sea foraging for them, then they switch. As the feeding parent comes out of the sea, the kids runs out of their safe holes as they know food is coming. The babies run up to the nearest adult looking for their meal, and if that is not their mom or dad, the adult in question pecks the baby on the head, as if to say, “I’m not your mom, keep looking!” So the air is filled with the vocalizations of all these penguins chattering to each other. They are not at all shy about the hundreds of humans on the wooden pathways, and stop to enjoy a little copulation along the way back to the nest. The whole thing is a riot and if you get the chance, do it. But check the weather report! It is freaking cold there at night! Adam drove us back to Melbourne and we made it to our room around midnight, definitely feeling like Melbourne was another great experience.

On our last full day of our adventure, we were scheduled for a private tour of Melbourne nightlife, called Dinner, Tales and Cocktails. We spent the day getting our packing game in order. We were a little apprehensive about this tour because on the website, it indicated it could be up to eight people, and not being serious party folk, we were afraid we would not enjoy a night of cocktails with strangers. But it turned out that we were the only folks for the tour. We were met by Liz, who amazingly turned out to be the partner of Adam, from our tour yesterday. She was awesome and took us to several spots we would never have found on our own. We really enjoyed her company, and learned many things about Melbourne. We had been struck by the many, many restaurants and bars that all seemed to be well-staffed and always at full capacity. Knowing that Australia had been totally locked down during COVID, we were amazed at how quickly the service industry seemed to have come back. Liz told us this was because people are paid a living wage in this restaurant industry and most make $25/hr. We knew that tipping was infrequent in both countries, and this is why. Servers feel respected, enjoy their work (and this was obvious) and don’t feel they are being taken advantage of. Liz knew the city well, had excellent driving skills in the evening rush, and Bob got a cocktail in a koala mug that she bought for him and that he will treasure along with all his other souvenirs. We had privately agreed that we would tell our guide we wanted to be back at the hotel by 9 pm but it was closer to 11 when we said goodbye to Liz. A really late night for us!

And so with heavy hearts we headed to the airport. Our flight back to Los Angeles was on Air New Zealand, and we had booked a skycouch, which is billed as a three chair section of the plane that converts to a bed and could allow two adults to sleep through the thirteen hour flight by paying economy prices. Sadly, this proved to be a marketing miss, and when we tried to lie down, we thought a crow bar would be needed to pull us out. But it really wasn’t too bad and with very little sleep we arrived at LAX. Our flight home was not for 12 hours so we booked a nearby hotel room using DayUse, an app that finds hotel rooms for a discount price for several hours. We headed to the Embassy Suites Hotel, and caught a few hours sleep before boarding our Delta flight home.

We knew this would be the trip of a lifetime and it sure was. NZ was more beautiful than we had hoped and our time with our Fellowship geeks was a hobbit lovers dream come true. Australia was exciting, informative and a total blast and we are so glad we added that to our travels. We would go back to either place in a heartbeat. I have always heard that travel broadens the mind and the sense of wonder and understanding in this world, and I am certain of that. People across the world are similar in their desires to have a peaceful life, enjoy their families and friends, and add something of value to the world. But the differences in cultures, viewpoints, architecture, art, music, and worldviews are instructional at the same time they are illuminating. The more I get to travel, the smaller I feel, and that is reassuring in the grand scheme of things. Feeling smaller makes any of my troubles and worries seem smaller too, and I find I am more and more able to cope with this sometimes scary world by realizing how many challenges our species and so many other species have overcome and managed to persevere. And I know how incredibly lucky I am.

It may be awhile before we head out again, so until then, thanks for reading and happy trails to you!