Melbourne Day 1 post!
We woke up bright and early on Friday to head to the Queen Victoria Market, which was highly recommended by a bunch of travel websites. First of all, the weather the entire time we were in Melbourne was less than ideal. It was like 55 degrees Fahrenheit the whole time and we didn't pack for that cold so we set out at 7:30 in our shorts and tshirts and practically froze to death walking the mile to the market. Once we got there, we got some breakfast from one of the cute little bakery stands, and walked around. The food part of the market was really nice and cute, but the shopping part reminded me of a giant garage sale. Everything looked dirty and used so we decided to head back to the hostel to take a nap before our Phillip Island tour instead. Before we left for the tour, we had to leave our private room and switch back into the main building in a six bedroom dorm. This time there were two bathrooms for a floor of like thirty people and we were sharing this little room with bunks with three random strangers, who we never ended up actually meeting. It was definitely a bit of a change from what we had the previous night.
At around 11:30, we got picked up for our tour. After an hour of driving around to various hostels picking up other people, we headed out on our drive, which ended up being around two and a half hours. We stopped half way for a sandwich break, where, of course, Alex, Christy and I stopped to get chocolate. Right before we got to the island, we stopped at a wildlife sanctuary. Although significantly smaller than the one we went to last month, there were kangaroos and koalas and sheep (so exotic...) and such that we took pictures with.
We then got on with our tour, got to Phillip Island, which is where a huge colony of penguins live, and saw the main beach. It was obviously way to cold to even stick your toes in the water, but the beach was super pretty with, as usual, waves bigger than I've ever seen. Then we went to a lookout point that had a bunch of penguin nests, with some baby penguins in them! There was also a big rock with seals on it in the distance, but it was too far to really see. Then, we finally got to the part we had been waiting for all day, the penguin parade!! There are grandstands set up near where the penguins usually come out of the ocean and you can watch them waddle back to their nests! Its the smallest species of penguins so they're only about a foot tall and they're all chubby because they're about to molt. It is seriously the most adorable thing I have ever seen. Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take pictures, so the ones here are ones I took from the internet... but we got to stand and watch them walk all the way to their nests. When they're reunited with their mate they make loud noises and flap their wings which was also precious. I'm sort of obsessed.
Anyway, it was super late by the time we drove all the way home and got back to our hostel, which proved to be a problem because the others in our dorm were already in bed. We tried to very discreetly use our phone flashlights to navigate and be as quiet as possible but I'm sure we failed at that. Then we crashed at around one in the morning to be able to wake up at six for our next tour!Melbourne Day 3 post!
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