G'day Mate!

We arrived at Base X late afternoon on Monday where we were informed that the floods had wiped out the power this meant that the rooms were half price and were a bargain $15 including free breakfast and dinner every day! So, we took a gamble and booked for the whole week at the cheaper price hoping the power would come back on at some point! We spent the night in total darkness with our only light being our trusty wind up torch! We woke on Tuesday morning with plans to head into the city and boarded the No.3 tram only to find that tickets were bought by coins only, not having enough change, we decided to risk it having been told that you could get away without paying anyway. Upon arrival at Flinders Street Station we were welcomed by a swarm of ticket police issuing hefty fines - luckily we managed to play the tourist card and scurried off with our tails between our legs!

We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around Melbourne and visited the Melbourne Gaol Museum which is an old prison where Ned Kelly and a number of other criminals were hanged and buried. We were disappointed by the city and, after a quick walk to Federation Square; we jumped back on the tram - this time paying for our tickets! Later that evening Kie met up with Lawrence and Eddy, two friends from school who are living in Melbourne, and spent the night having a few beers at Coffee Palace and Cushion while Sophie stayed at Base with fellow roommate, Emily and took part in the pub quiz! Further entertainment was provided when Kie came back wasted so much so that in the middle of the night he fell out of bed and, after a few cross words, slept on the floor where he'd fallen (much to the amusement of our other roommates, some of whom we hadn't yet been introduced to!)

Wednesday was a write-off for Kie as he spent the majority of the day in bed recovering from his nocturnal antics; only venturing out for food. Sophie, meanwhile, did some laundry and went to the beach with Emily for a couple of hours. Thursday was another quiet day as the weather was grim! We caught up on the internet as well as sorting out photo's and blogs.

Friday was far more fun! Despite the continued bad weather, we woke up with fresh heads and renewed energy - by this time the group in our room had become close so, as it was raining, we spent the morning pottering around before Romola, Adam and the two of us headed to the pub for a few beers just to get out of the room. When the rain let off we made a quick dash to Woolworths and grabbed some "Chups & Dups" (aka crisps and dips) and ran back to the room to meet Lisa, Sarah and Flo-Rida (aka Florian). We spent the rest of the night holding our own "Goon Party" playing drinking games. We must have been making some noise as throughout the night we would get random knocks at the door from people wishing to join in! Once the goon had been exhausted we headed downstairs to Red Eye, the hostel bar, and carried on drinking while listening to live music from Casey Dean.

Saturday came and we all woke blurry eyed, all except Lisa who was still buzzing and ready to go - giving out options of swimming, badminton or ice skating for the day's activities - a few members of the room followed while the rest of us headed out to the park with more chups and dups before going to the beach and sunbathing for an hour or so. Whilst at the beach we were witness to a surreal conversation between two guys who had just met, they were discussing the most explicit and personal things at the top of their voices. Despite trying not to listen we were unable to avoid them, which spurred Kie and Adam on with the jokes. Kie's greatest line being "go down the beach, talk about chucks and ducks" (following the same rule as chups and dups!) These two sayings became a frequently heard thing in Room 116. After what seemed like forever, the two strangers left together while we all chuckled amongst ourselves!

Later that evening we splashed out, along with Romola, Adam and Lisa, and went to St Kilda Open Air Cinema; located on top of the St Kilda baths, looking out over the sea. The experience was made even better as, when it got colder, Adam and Lisa went back to the hostel and smuggled out our duvets and pillows! We had all turned up somewhat unprepared for the chill on top of the building - not realising either that it would be quite so windy. Thanks to Adam and Lisa we were the cosiest cinema-goers there! We saw 'The Tourist' which we really enjoyed and it was awesome, but unusual, to be at the cinema under the stars!

On Sunday we went to St Kilda Festival - a music festival which closes all the roads of St Kilda and is free to the public. We were fortunate enough to be in Melbourne at the time of the festival and luckily the weather was great so we enjoyed a day of lying on the grass listening to live music and wandering round the stalls, shops and rides before heading home, playing some drinking games and watching Michael McIntyre.

VALENTINES DAY! We had hired a car in preparation for a day trip to Mornington Peninsula so we woke early and caught the tram into the city ready to pick our Hyundai Getz at 8am. Once we were comfortable and Kie knew where he was headed, we made our way to Sorrento - which Sophie was unaware of. On the way Kie said he had planned a surprise and asked Sophie "What would be the best thing I could say to you right now?" which Sophie was unable to answer so Kie rephrased it "What is the best thing we could be doing today?" to which Sophie replied "Seeing dolphins", Kie smiled and said "Not just seeing, swimming" - after a few tears Sophie thanked Kie and was ridiculously excited!

We arrived at Sorrento a little early so we decided to hunt down a bakery for a quick breakfast and shortly after made our way to the pier where we waited for our boat to arrive. Although the boat was small there were approximately 20 people including the staff onboard. We went with a company called Polperro, a family run business with amazing staff! Troy was the Captain of the boat, accompanied by his brother, Ben and colleague Jess - all of whom went round personally introducing themselves to each passenger and remembered everyone's names. It made a nice touch being spoken to by name so quickly after meeting everyone!

We had barely set off when the dolphins came out to play and before we knew it we were in our wetsuits, putting on our snorkels and getting into the freezing cold water. There were two ropes attached to the back of the boat where we were to hold on whilst being pulled along. After only seconds in the water we were joined by two dolphins swimming alongside us before they shot off! Unfortunately, despite having the underwater camera with us, we were only able to get one photo of the dolphins underwater, simply because they were so damn fast! Up on deck we were able to make up for the lack of underwater shots with some brilliant pictures. Again, the dolphins were jumping out of the water so fast that we kept missing them, but we managed to get a couple nonetheless! Once the dolphins went off to feed we made our way to the seal structure, a manmade wooden hut in the middle of the ocean which is home to a large number of seals. As soon as we were back in the water, the seals came over to play - we had been warned not to hold our hands out as they may think we had food for them! Although there were some baby seals, many of them were huge and made equally big noises - they definitely weren't shy as they came bounding up to us, twirling around and swimming alongside us. We were able to get much better underwater shots and even some videos of the seals as they didn't shoot off here, there and everywhere like the playful dolphins! As we made our way back to dry land the dolphins followed our boat and we took our chance to get as close as physically possible to get some last minute shots. They were beautiful and glided effortlessly alongside us. We both had a great day but Sophie especially thought it was the best day she'd had during her travels.

Sophie had been keen to touch the dolphins and even get a sneaky kiss but, after speaking to the staff on Polperro, later realised the only way you'd be able to do so would be with captive dolphins. There is a restriction on how many people are allowed out to swim with the dolphins and it is forbidden to touch or feed them. It was so much better to be able to swim with wild dolphins, which aren't trained or held captive - they were just as playful as Sophie had imagined and were really intrigued by us. It actually felt better to know that, despite having some human interaction, these dolphins aren't going to be affected by us humans or become reliant on us for their food.

What a great end to our Australian experience. We are now on our way to New Zealand for some Kiwi adventures, and we can't wait!

Lots of love, Sophie and Kie xx