My planned lie in didn't quite happen, but that allowed me to get into town earlier so that I could embark on the second visitor's walk, that I picked up a leaflet on in the visitors centre. I walked past the Sidney Myer Music Bowl, which looked a pretty impressive place to watch bands, although there was nothing coming up that I would particularly want to go and see. The Shrine of Remembrance had some pretty good views when you walked up to the top, and having a look at all the different buildings in Observatory Gate was pretty interesting- before they started their astronomical work, settlers hadn't been able to keep track of time, but once local time had been established by observing the stars, they put in a clock in the town centre and now everybody could agree on what time work should start and finish, and the trains could run by timetable.

Walking through the botanical gardens was absolutely beautiful, and I really want to bring people here for a picnic. Overlooking the ornamental lake would be ideal, and it would be a lot cheaper than paying the $48 for high tea in the tea rooms! I didn't realise until halfway through the Cemellia Collection, that Cemellia was the plant tea comes from. I liked smelling all the different plants in the herb garden, and looking around the Plant Craft Cottage, although they were closing when I was there so I didn't spend as much time looking round as I would have liked. They didn't have one on today, but when they do visitors can watch the classes they hold, which include things like basketry, paper making and needlework. They had a shop selling their crafts, and also a room giving examples of the sort of things they do in them- I would have loved to take Grandma there as I think she would enjoy looking round, as would I have loved to show Katie (from Uni) the herbarium, although she probably knows already the techniques they use to identify plants.

The last section of the walk was through Alexandra Gardens, which is where The Age good food month are hosting the night noodle markets, so I got a glimpse of what to expect if I went back there, which I hope to do.

Next I went to the RMIT University, who were hosting a gallery called Music, Melbourne and Me for Melbourne Music week. It was mostly just posters advertising the various artists who had played in Melbourne, but there was a bit showcasing stage outfits, including Kylie's 'showgirl' outfit. There was also a tent set up where it gave you the opportunity to feel like a celebrity by filming you answering interview style questions. A man started talking to me who was slightly odd because he wasn't very clear in anything he said- all I got was that he worked in the booths at Flinders Street station and discovered he was creative, so he showed me his art which was stick drawings of a plane and a tow car talking to each other. He pulled out a Lint chocolate bar which had one of his drawings on the packaging, but I couldn't understand what he meant about why it was in that packaging.

I met up with Mia in the same cafe we met up with Alice, as it's just opposite her work, and on the way got a free hot chocolate because there were people trying to sell Nescafe capsule coffee machines, and so they were giving away samples. She started at 5, so then I went to Myer to look round their Christmas food, which wasn't that great, although I did buy a Panforte, because I had seen a lot of them round and didn't know what one was.