It's been a busy few days here in Melbourne and I've got a lot to fill you in on - so folks, once again be prepared for another long posting (but as always, I'll try to be as short and sweet as possible...) FRIDAY - PENGUINS Ok this was the day I was waiting for - today I was going to see wild penguins for the very first time and how excited was I. Chris was driving me to Phillip Island to see the little beauties. Well we left fairly early but as they don't appear until night time we had a few hours to kill, so off into the hills we went for a ride on Puffing Billy - a local old steam train that goes through the Victorian countryside. It was nice and the forests were beautiful but what I really wanted were Penguins and at about 5pm we arrived at my destination. Phillip Island is about 2 hours drive from Melbourne and it's also renowned for seals so first port of call whilst waiting for my penguins was The Nobbies where the seals are meant to show up - oh yeah!! Well I believe the seals are another of those Aussie myths created to get tourists to go to desolate places in the hope of seeing something that ain't there, but The Nobbies was spectacular coast line and guess what, we saw penguins there, little baby penguins waiting in their little homes for mum and dad to come home from work with dinner and they were just so cute (get that penguin out of your rucksack woman - if only). So was there any point in going to the Penguin Parade?? Of course there was. This is really well arranged - you get about 200 people on a beach sitting on benches waiting for the little things to show up and it's all managed by volunteer rangers to make sure that people don't put any in their rucksack to take home...!! Well at about 9.15 pm when the sun went down they turned up and there were loads of the little things - they are actually called Little Penguins and guess what, are the world's littlest (about a foot and half high) and they are gorgeous and provided some of the best comedy I've seen whilst traveling. Ok they all bunch together in the ocean and then when they feel safe they try and jump out of the waves on to the beach and race in a waddle like fashion up the dunes to the kids waiting at home. Trouble is they don't jump very well so they kept falling over or getting caught up in waves again and dragged back out to sea so it took quite a few attempts. However, finally they get there and you get the little fellas waddling up the beach in a penguin like fashion and you feel like cheering them for what they've achieved - spectacular stuff. Tired and emotional it's time to head for home, it's just a shame penguins don't like flashlights on cameras otherwise I'd have some great photos for you all. SATURDAY - CULTURE Wake up to rain again so it's off to the city for me today to see if I can find any Aussie culture. First stop though is a pub (surprise, surprise I hear you all cry) but there was culture there. It was Young & Jackson's, which is Melbourne's oldest bar and home to the nude portrait of Chloe - see beer and culture (superb). Right the rain is now torrential so I head off to the ACMI in Federation Square to see the Stanley Kubrick exhibition and this was well worth the money. Ok it's Chinese New Year today so I decide to swim up to Chinatown to see what's going down - not a lot just old women dancing - don't stay there too long but look there's an English pub on the corner (well it was raining). SUNDAY - MUSIC Big Day Out in fact. And it had stopped raining, the sun was out and it was hot, hot, hot. How unlike the English version? In fact, very, and not just the weather. Firstly they have this odd stage arrangement whereby they put two stages together so as soon as one band finishes the next band are starting up right next door - this means you're constantly turning 45 degrees to watch or 90 degrees to run. Next the beer situation. They have that stupid token method but I'm used to that as been to a couple of festivals in the UK with this stupid situation but as we know, bands and beer go hand in hand, but not in Oz... if you want a beer you get shoved into these drinking pens at the back of the arena which have great big fences around them and security guards at the front and you have to drink in the pens which means you drink or see bands - I stayed quite sober. So down to music and who did I see? Well I started off with The Subways (well you have to support the Brits) who jumped about a lot and screamed a lot and that was about it. Next was beer time and whilst in the pen I thought I heard New Order so run to check it out and found this local Melbourne band called Cut Copy who had one song that sounded like New Order (which I'd almost missed by the time I got there) but who I quite liked and who were a bit (well a lot) 80s sounding (Patrick stop squirming!!). Next was Wolfmother who are big in Australia and who were actually pretty good and they had this really, really cute lead singer (fickle, moi??). Not quite so cute looking were The Magic Numbers but they provided a nice Sunday afternoon sway along. Soulwax were next on my hit list and they were great (prob the best I've seen them) and they did an excellent version of E Talking dubbed with Funky Town (believe me, it was good) and the Aussie's love them. Ok Franz Ferdinand - GO HOME - I'd forgotten how bad this lot were so it was time to loose myself in the drinking pen again which I did for a while until I heard a great sound coming from the Dance Tent, I checked my programme and realized Mylo were playing so I checked them out and glad I did as one of my highlights and then I rounded of the day nicely with 2manyDJs - superb, before attempting to join the bun fight for the trams. All in all Big Day Out was a pretty Good Day Out. MONDAY - SPECTACULAR SCENERY (and KOLAS!!!!) Well we got up really early yesterday as Chris and I were heading west to do the Great Ocean Road. And it was stunning - big dramatic cliffs, sweeping hills, great rocks jutting out of the sea including The Grotto, London Bridge (which has partly fallen down), The Arch, Loch & Gorge and of course, the Twelve Apostles (well there are only 8 left now) and this is interspersed with beautiful surfing beaches and lovely seaside towns. I was also promised Kolas in the wild which as you may or may not know are pretty rare to see even out here - in fact I was thinking that they only exist in zoos and wild ones were just another Aussie tourist myth. But I was wrong. Chris took me to Cape Ottway and there they were in the trees and not just sleeping - in fact on little bear was pretty active. And they are just the cutest things (next to penguins of course) and my rucksack was almost open again... I'm actually so glad I saw these and it made my day complete. On the way back to Melbourne we stopped at Bells Beach, which is famous for surfing - did I have a go??? Then we hit Anglesea golf course for a round with some kangaroos (true..). We arrived home late last night and I was tired but very happy and contented as it had been another great Oz experience. Well, later today I'm saying bye to Melbourne for a while and getting the night ferry over to Tassie for 10 days and I'm really looking forward to seeing England and hopefully a Tassie Tiger (do they exist??).