2/20/15. Melbourne

We had a wonderful and long day today.  The weather was in the 80's, but with a lovely breeze.  We started off with a bus tour of the city after breakfast.  We drove by all of the sports stadiums - cricket, soccer, football, and tennis.  The were all huge stadiums and apparently fill up when the matches are on.  We went to the Old Melbourne Gaol and were given a private tour.  We learned the story of Melbourne's famous outlaw (bushranger), Ned Kelly.  He and his gang (think Billy the Kid) heard that the police were closing in on them and built body armor out of plows.  When the confrontation was over, Ned had 29 bullets in his arms and legs, but was alive.  He was taken to the Melbourne jail where he was hung at the age of 25.  The gaol was built by Scottish stone masons and when they finished, they were commissioned to build Melbourne University nearby.  The hours were long and the work hard so they eventually went on strike.  Their mantra was 888 - 8 hours of work, 8 hours of recreation, and 8 hours of rest.  Their wishes were granted and that began the 8 hour work day.  The idea spread throughout Australia and then around the world - the year was 1856!  There is a monument to this effort outside the gaol and I will try to put a pic on the blog.  We stopped at St. Patrick's Cathedral, but couldn't go in as there was a private Mass going on. We then took a stroll through Fitzroy Gardens and saw Cook's Cottage, Captain Cook's childhood home that was brought over from England and rebuilt here.  We visited the Shrine of Remberance - dedicated to the soldiers of WWI and finally took a lovely walk through the Royal Botanical Gardens, where we had lunch in a cafe by the lake.  We saw a black swan there (we saw many of them on Tasmania also) and a number of moorhens.  The flowers and trees were lovely and we soaked up the atmosphere as we know we won't see the same at home for a long time.  We went back to the hotel for a short "feet up" and then went down to the beach for dinner.  There were a large number of kite surfers at the beach - great fun to watch.  After dinner we walked down a long pier to see the sunset and watch the little penguins come back to the rocks to their nests.  They are very small and quite cute.  We didn't get back to the hotel until after 10.  I will try to put pics on separately.