Thursday, March 15, 2018

March of the Penguins

Melbourne Laneway

We had the most marvelous walk this morning through Melbourne’s famously funky laneways.  I would call them galleries as they are covered pedestrian streets. We walked through about 4 or 5 of them before we ended back at our start.  They have a very British feel with tea rooms and hat shops.  After the walk we hopped on a tram for a ride to the Queen Victoria Market, or Vicki’s as the locals call it.  The Central Business District (CBD) has a free tram system.  Cool!  Oh yeah, back to Vicki’s place.  It spreads over two city blocks and has what you would expect: fish of every variety, meat of every variety, cheese, sausage, fruits, vegetables.  We loaded up on, you guessed it, cheese and sausage.  

Phillip Island

This afternoon we rode to Phillip Island, a sanctuary island that was once a community of holiday homes.  At one point, the government realized the unique and fragile quality of the island and began to buy out the homeowners.  Eventually all the homes were purchased  torn down.  The coast line is beautiful: rocky and wild.  We took a board walk along the coast line where there were penguin box nests.  When the houses here were torn down, penguins were found to be nesting under them.  The park service built little ground boxes for them in place. They continued the practice along the coast.  As night fell we gathered at the beach and watched hundreds of the Little Blue Penguins come ashore and walk past us to their burrows.  What a sight!  Pictures of everything but penguins at flickr. They are not allowed.