25 Nov 2009 - Day 3 (Part 1): Old Melbourne Gaol

When we woke up this morning, we realized that Javier's cheek was quite red and after taking a closer look, it's actually rashes. We suspected it's because of his own saliva that kept flowing out from his mouth. So we brought him to a nearby chemist to see if we could purchase some rash cream to apply on his cheeks. When the chemist saw him, she said it's actually not too serious and applying normal diaper rash cream should be able to heal it. According to her, it will only be a concern if the color of the rashes turn a bit "golden". So we did not purchase any cream as we already had our own diaper rash cream.

Our plan for Day 3 is to visit a couple of attractions within Melbourne City itself. First we visited the nearby Old Melbourne Gaol, which is just two streets away from our hotel, at Russell Street. We passed by a Public Bath on our way to the Gaol.

Old Melbourne Gaol consists of a bluestone building and courtyard and is located next to the old City Police Watch House and City Courts buildings (both now occupied by RMIT University). Once again, this is another attraction that is covered by our Smartvisit cards.

The Old Melbourne Gaol is currently a museum and is Victoria's oldest surviving penal establishment. Step inside the last cellblock of Victoria's first remand prison and explore one of Melbourne's earliest buildings. Investigate the prison lives of such people as Ned Kelly, just one of the 136 men and women hanged at the Old Melbourne Gaol. The building was a focus during some of Australia's most significant historical moments, including the Gold Rush, the Eureka Stockade Rebellion and World War II.

As we were pushing two strollers, we stayed on the ground floor most of the time. There are only stairs to go up to level 2 and 3. I carried Jerlene up to higher levels for a short while and after which, she started climbing up and down the stairs herself.

After spending sometimes in the cells, we walked out to the courtyard where there were many students sitting and running around the place.

Our tickets actually allow us to have a guided tour to the Watch House. The Watch House Experience is a forty minute interactive experience like no other. With a Charge Sergeant as guide, visitors are ‘arrested’ and encounter what it is like to be locked up. Nothing has changed in this minimalist site since the police and inmates left in the 1990's. After the role play, visitors self guide through the watch house taking in sound points and multi media imagery that is educational and informative. However, due to the inconvenience of having strollers in this tour, we decided to give it a miss. Anyway, this tour is not in our plan.

From Old Melbourne Gaol, we walked down Russell Street and along the way, we finally found Woolworths, in which we have been "searching" for it in the past 2 days. We had our lunch in one of the shopping complex before we moved out to our next attraction, Melbourne River Cruise.......

24 Nov 2009 - Day 2 (Part 3): Magnificent view from Eureka Skydeck 88

Before entering Eureka Tower, we spent a little while along the south bank of Yarra River. Jerlene just woke up from the long bus ride and I wanted to freshen her up a bit before going up the tower.

With our See Melbourne Smartvisit cards, we can free entry into Eureka SkyDeck 88. It invites you to have a view from the top of the world’s tallest residential tower! The 360 degree view of entire Melbourne City is really superb! Everyone was busy taking pictures through the glass. Here are some of the photos that I've taken and let the pictures say it all!

There is also a door that leads to a small outdoor area. Though the view there is direct (without the glass), there is metal grail all around, for obvious reason. That area was very windy. The moment Jerlene knows how to operate the door, she started running in and out. Javier, on the other hand, enjoyed seeing his own reflection on the reflective wall.....very funny............

The Eureka SkyDeck 88 is the only place in the world where you can suspend yourself within ‘The Edge', an entirely safe and secure glass cube that gives you an uncluttered view of Melbourne from 300 metres up in the sky! As this is not included in our Smartvisit card, we did not attempt it.

One amazing fact is that the top 10 floors of Eureka Tower has glass that is 24 carat gold plated. Situated adjacent from the beautiful Yarra River, the Eureka SkyDeck 88 is home to the fastest elevators in the Southern Hemisphere. That means, that the pain of having to climb the mere 3,000+ stairs to the top has been done for you, as you travel up 9 metres per second!

We spent close to 2 hours there. Our initial intention is to stay till sunset so that we can enjoy the night view. However, that would mean another hour or so as the sky will only start to turn dark from about 8:30pm. We decided to leave the place and come back another night. Our smartvisit cards allow multiple entries to an attraction on different day.

The moment we got out of Eureka Tower, the weather started to turn cold. So we quickly put on jackets for the little ones and ourselves.

We took a short walk to Melbourne Arts Centre where there are galleries that are free to enter. The centre is located just south of the Yarra River. It comprises two buildings linked by a series of walkways. The Theatres Building is most distinctive with its crowning spire, and is visible from all sorts of interesting angles around town. The circular building next door is the Hammer Hall, home to the internationally renowned Melbourne Symphony. One interesting fact is that the performance stage is actually below the water level of the Yarra River outside.

Jerlene simply enjoyed running around the open space and her squeaky shoes again attracted many attention. After our dinner, it was already pretty late. I took some night shot on our way back to hotel.


It's a tiring day 2 but enjoyable. Looking forward to day 3!

24 Nov 2009 - Day 2 (Part 2): Half day afternoon Dandenong Tour

After spending a few hours in Queen Victoria Market, it's about time to get back to our hotel and wait for the shuttle that will bring us to the departure point for our half day afternoon tour to Dandenong. This tour is included in the list of attractions that are covered by our See Melbourne and Beyond Smartvisit cards.

The shuttle brought us to Fed Square where everyone gathered there before departing for their day tours. Our Dandenong tour is operated by Grayline. As we had not taken our lunch, I quickly went to a nearby cafe and bought some pastries. The bus departed at about 1:30pm, 15mins later than schedule, as there were a couple of people who came late.

Before heading to Dandenong Ranges, we had a quick city tour which is part of the tour itinerary. Places that we passed by, just to name a few, were Chinatown, St Paul's Cathedral, Arts and Cultural Centre etc. We were not too interested about these places for now as we will probably visit them in the coming week. Soon we were on the highway towards Dandenong ranges. It was a pretty hot day and most people on the bus were sleeping, including my two little ones.

As we were driving up the ranges, we stopped by a picnic ground (Grants) where we had the opportunity to hand feed some of the Australian native birds, such as parrots and rosellas.

It's a unique experience and we all enjoyed it. Jerlene was brave enough to feed the birds as well. After we used up all the birdseeds provided, we joined back the group to have some local bush billy tea, prepared by our tour guide.



It's a great feeling to come up close with nature and Sherbrooke Forest was all around us. We stayed there for about 20mins before continue our journey to the summit of Mt Dandenong.

At Dandenong summit, we were able to see Melbourne city and Port Phillip Bay, though not very clear.


There was a Giant's chair at the garden where we took quite a number of photos. We only had about 15mins here as it was about 4pm and we needed to get back to city by 5pm.

On our way back, there was a slight jam into the city. Instead of dropping off at Fed Square, we requested the tour guide to drop us off at Eureka Tower, which is our next destination of the day.

24 Nov 2009 - Day 2 (Part 1): Queen Victoria Market

This is day 2 of our Melbourne trip. Javier woke up with some big smiles while Jerlene was still sleeping. Seeing his smiles had energized me for another day packed with activities.



Looking out from our room's windows, we saw some construction right next door. Think they are building a residential apartment. Fortunately the noise from the construction site did not bother any of us.

Looking slightly further out, we can see Queen Victoria Market, which was where we will be going in a while.

Queen Victoria Market is Victoria's premier open-air market. It's a thriving and vital place pulsating with life. The friendly competition between stallholders, and their concern for customers, is what gives the Market its Old World charm and the addictive power to draw millions of visitors each year.

The vibrant, cosmopolitan atmosphere of this historic site has endeared the Market to Melburnians for 130 years. The Market is probably best known for its huge variety of fresh produce. Almost 50% of the Market area is dedicated to the sale of fresh produce, including fresh fruits and vegetables, meat, chicken, seafood and delicatessen products. The remainder of the Market is used for variety and speciality goods, with Sundays being the most popular day for this category. On Sundays, the hustle and bustle of the weekday Market gives way to a more relaxed and leisurely family day. Queen Street is closed and converted into an outdoor cafe area, with children's rides and other activities.


As we walked past the stalls, we took down the price of those items that we were interested in. We will definitely return to get them nearing the end of our trip.

Jerlene was wearing a pair of squeaky shoes and as she walked, she attracted attention of many people. Just for the 1-2 hours that we had spent in the market, we could hear more than 10 comments about her shoes. I guess such squeaky shoes are uncommon in Melbourne.