After picking up the camper van a week ago, we've finally made it to Melbourne. But what an adventure we've had! We've driven up steep mountains, navigated hairpin turns and gravel roads, driven through almighty thunderstorms with lightning flashing all around, and then through mists as all the rain evaporated off the roads, and dodged massive road trains. We've certainly put Vanny (the camper van) through his paces! We've seen all manner of wildlife from kookaburras to kangaroos, and showered with more millipedes than I care to mention.

Friday 11th March - Palm Beach and Blackheath. We picked up the camper van and headed straight for Palm Beach. Why? Because that's where Home and Away is filmed! It was fun to see the beach, it looks just like on the telly. We also had our first sighting of kookaburras. We then headed over to the Blue Mountains and stayed in Blackheath. Driving along the motorway we had our first Blue Mountains thunderstorm. Blimey! Thunder, lightning and rain the likes of which we'd never seen before - made the drive a little more interesting!

Saturday 12th March - Echo Point and the Three Sisters. It took a bit longer than we expected to get there as there was a lookout point at every turn and we stopped at every one to admire the views. Echo Point has some really pretty views but the site has changed a lot since Chris was here in 2002. It's a lot more commercial as they cash in on all tourists. There's a gift shop, cafe and very expensive parking, and the walks leading off from the point are all paved. Our visit was cut short by another mountain storm. They seem to happen every afternoon without fail, and then it's game over for a few hours. This time, instead of being tucked up in Vanny, we were out on a walk. Within minutes we were drenched. We gave up on Echo Point and decided to head off. We then spent the night in Oberon.

Sunday 13th March - the Jenolan Caves. These are filled with weird and wonderful rock formations. Then the skies darkened for the daily storm so we headed to Canberra. However, having not yet gotten to grips with distances being in kms, and with quite how big Australia is, we mistimed our arrival in Canberra for after all the caravan sites had closed. We ended up spending the night in a pub car park just off the motorway. But that's life on the road for you! Chris says it was the best night's sleep he's had to far in Vanny!

Monday 14th March - Driving. Because w were *still* getting used to how big Australia is, we underestimated the drive to our next stop and ended up in a caravan site in Omeo. The drive there was horrendous as the 'highway' took us up a mountain track that was unsealed for the most of it. We had to drive along at 20km/h so it took forever. We did get our first sightings of wild kangaroos though! As we turned one corner we saw a small dark shape disappear off the side of the road and into the bushes. It stopped not to far from the road so we were just about able to make out a little kangaroo - very exciting! That was until we turned the next corner and caught a massive kangaroo scrabbling up the side of the mountain!

Tuesday 15th March - Wilson's Promontory. We took a well deserved break here and stayed for a couple of nights. The Prom, as it's known, is a nature reserve and it is well worth a visit. The scenery is beautiful, with golden beaches, woodland and mountains clamouring for our attention. Our site was just thirty seconds walk from a beach and we could hear the waves crashing on the sand as we drifted to sleep.

We took a walk and had yet another first in our list of animal encounters - emus! Chris spotted them in the trees up ahead of us. It was a bit scary being close to wild animals like that, with no fences or zoo keepers to keep us safe. After the emus had moved on we carried on through the woods and had another encounter, though this one wasn't much fun! We spotted a snake about three feet long crawling up along the path just a couple of feet away from us. We froze, terrified, but the snake took no interest in us whatsoever! Just to be safe, we stayed frozen to the spot for a few minutes after it had gone. We then spent the next few hours traipsing up a mountain trying to find animals, with no luck. Lots of poo, but no actual animals. It was only when we'd made it back down the mountain and had Vanny in our sights that we saw a wallaby (typical, we spend hours wandering about and they end up being right by the car park!). Just as we saw the wallaby, it saw us too, and there were a tense few minutes as we all kept very still and sized each other up. The wallaby decided we didn't look too threatening and carried on making its way through the woods munching on plants. As we followed it we heard some rustling a little way off to our right. It was only another wallaby! It was amazing! Then, more rustling to our left and yet another wallaby! We couldn't believe our luck! We kept watching quietly, but wallaby 3 didn't seem happy with our presence. He stared avidly at us for several minutes before thumping his feet and sending the other wallabies scampering into the woodlands as he followed. We spent the evening watching the sun set over Squeaky Beach. Yes, squeaky! And it was! It's made of grains of quartz and this, for some reason, makes it squeak when you walk/run/jump/skid on it. It has to be heard to be believed!

Wednesday 16th March - Wilson's Promontory. The next day we went for another walk on the Prom. This time we stumbled on a whole family of emus! Whilst they aren't flighty birds, they do seem quite shy and made their way into the woods as soon as they heard any noise. As we were driving on a gravel road (sorry Vanny, more gravel!) we weren't exactly discrete. We watched from a distance but weren't able to get very close. We also saw another wallaby, but they're getting a bit old hat now ;-)

Thursday 17th March - Philip's Island. This is famous for its Penguin Parade. A colony of little penguins lives on the island, and every evening they return from feeding in the seas to their burrows on the mainland. You get to sit on the beach and watch them coming in from the sea before walking about on the promenade and spotting them in the bushes as they make their way home. They are the smallest penguins in the world, just 35cm tall. They are about to start moulting and when they do that they can't swim and get food so they have to stuff themselves to get them through the moulting period. This means they double in weight from 1kg to 2nd, and meant there were a lot of fat little penguins!

The island is also home to a Moto GP circuit. We didn't visit this. At the caravan site we had another animal encounter, this time with a cute little possum which came down from the tree behind us. Cute, but mental. It would stare at us intently, come creeping towards us, and then run off and hide under Vanny. We're not sure what it wanted, maybe previous campers had fed it, but it's eerie gaze and long claws put us off getting too friendly! Later that night we heard some awful squealing and a horrible clacking of claws on wood as three possums decide to kick off in our tree. Fortunately it didn't go on too long else we don't think we'd have got any sleep that night!

Friday 18th March - Melbourne. We came here with the sole intention of taking the Neighbours tour and only to discover that it only runs on week days and we're only here for the weekend. So today we've had to amuse ourselves in Melbourne. Y'know, it turns out there's not a lot to do in Melbourne! It appears to just be sushi bars, coffee shops and designer stores. There really isn't anything else here!

Saturday 19th March - Melbourne. We took a trip up the tallest observation tower in the southern hemisphere to kill some time. However, Lindsay felt very queasy up there! She felt like she was on a boat, it really felt like the whole thing was rocking! So we didn't stay up there very long.

Tomorrow we head off to the Great Ocean Road. We're really looking forward to this bit, it's supposed to be spectacular.

Bye!
Lindsay and Chris