Hiya to everyone and greetings from Melbourne, We've been here for a week after Melbourne and to be honest our first feelings was to get the next flight back to Tassie !!!???!!! We saw our accomodation on the internet and it looked really nice with decent sized rooms in a massive old house ('Eildon Mansion') - when we turned up it was a different story - the house was under renovation with all the paint peeling of the walls and 1 toilet to share between about 20 people !! + to make matters worse it was in the middle of the red light district and you could see the 'ladies of the night' out of the windows when you went to the loo.... as you can imagine Shelley was not pleased at all but as the place was a bargain ($220/week) we decided to stick it out.. Apart from the accomodation we did really like Melbourne - we were staying in ST Kilda and we had a couple of really nice walks along the Esplanade and around the fun fair. We sppent most of our time in the city (to get away from the house !!) and we had a really nice day strolling along by the river and around the Botanical Gardens (where the postcard photo was taken). Next stop is Sydney and we're both really looking forward to getting there and seeing all of the sights although it is going to be very strange spending Christmas Day on the beach - we'll be thinking of you all back home. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to everyone - we'll see you all in 2005 !!!!!!!!!!!!! all our love Rob and Shelley xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx