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| A commemorative stamp mosaic at Healsville Wildlife Sanctuary |
After the long journey from Chile to LA, and our whistle stop tour of Oahu, I felt I wanted a bit of a break from the blog. The plan at the beginning of Australia was to stay in Williamstown, a suburb just west of Melbourne and home to Crystal's friends from her University of Victoria exchange days. We didn't have much planned for those three weeks so it seemed like a good time to rest the keyboard. Now that I am looking back over that period and choosing some pictures for the blog, it seems we did quite a bit! So to save from running out of ink, this post more of a photo journal, mostly pictures and captions.
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Apr 3rd/4th - Crossing the International Date Line and the Equator almost perfectly. I wonder if the flight planner did it this way just for fun?
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The 11 hour daytime flight was reasonably painless thanks to the plane not being too full and there being a good choice of movies
 | First order of business on arrival in Australia, covid tests. We used our own and reported them to no one. Hopefully we got that right
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| Apr 6 - Jet lag = early mornings. It quickly became obvious that Williamstown was an idyllic place to live. Seafront, history, cafes, parks |
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Apr 10th - Healsville Wildlife Sanctuary with Rebecca. Just another morning nap for this little koala
 | Kangaroo doing a good impression of a pet dog scratching its back in the gravel
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 | Baby marsupial in pouch
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Tree kangaroo. You can jut make out the end of its ridiculously long tail in the left of the picture
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Ostrich at Healsville
 | This Kookaburra has a broken wing and the vet is pinning it. We could watched this through a floor to ceiling window in the medical centre at Healsville. Quite a privilege
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| After watching the pros take care of the animals, the kids can have their turn in the "training" hospital. A great set-up for taking care of poorly koalas |
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Platypus plus three impersonators
 | The bird show was a highlight of Healsville, showing off these amazing animals and their dedicated carers
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After the trip to Healsville we saw St Kilda vs Hawthorne Australian Rules Football (aka "Aussie Rules" or more commonly "footy") at the legendary Melbourne Cricket Ground
 | April 11th - Another perk of borrowing other kids' houses: other kids toys
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 | Genevieve's back yard is home to Jasper the Guinea Pig. An instant love affair ensued
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 | April 12th - The free library and reading space that we stumbled upon one afternoon at the Botanical Gardens in Williamstown, just across the road from the Macleod's house
 | April 13th - Ocean Grove cider house, garden and family get together
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 | Apr 14th - One of the big attractions of borrowing both the Percovich and Maclead houses was the hoverboard. The kids both took to reading, eating and other routine tasks while wheeling effortlessly around the place
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 | A reading date in the botanical gardens
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 | April 15th - Another revisit to a spot where once stood two lonely backpackers, separated by three years and a continent, little suspecting the intersecting arcs of their respective futures
 | Connecting onto the tram from Flinders Street Station on our way to Fitzroy Gardens
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 | Easter scavenger hunt at Fitzroy Gardens
 | Cooks' cottage at Fitzroy gardens
 | April 16th - I always like to capture these moments of tranquility. We're lucky to have two readers
 | Wheelchair racing simulator at the Williamstown Scienceworks where we went with Taj. This town really does have it all
 | In Australia you get an Easter Bilby
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 | April 19th - Lorne on the Great Ocean Road, where stayed with Kate and the four kids at Dene's parents' place. We took this picture when cockatoos were a novelty. Within minutes we realised that they were like pigeons in Trafalgar Square...
We took a nice long walk from the house, down the creek, to the cafe and along the beach to the pier and back. From left to right: Toby, Felicity, Dan, Ella, Charlie and Jack
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The coastline along the Great Ocean Road, referred to in places as the Surf Coast, really is wild, rugged and beautiful
 | Parrots up for hand-feeding on the deck in Lorne
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Am I squinting or grimacing? I know I was excited and apprehensive. I love being in the water but I can't really surf and I was about to be embarrassed at best, drowned at worst
 | Apr 21st - Kate, Ella and Crystal at the end of their hike up from the house in Lorne to Erskin Falls
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Crystal and I both stood at this spot separately over two decades ago
 | April 22nd - Back in Williamstown we stayed on Nelson Place and had one of the nicest Airbnbs we've stayed in, full of historic character and modern comforts, notwithstanding the 5am extractor fan start-up for the cafe and bakery downstairs!
 | Wandering along the pier near Nelson Place in Williamstown
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 | Apr 23rd - Crystal and Genevieve checking out the bike routes in WIlliamstown
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| A very nice memorial to those who served on HMAS Yarra in WWII. It was eventually sunk off Singapore with a lot of loss of life after tours as far afield as the Mediterranean |
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| There is a spit in Williamstown along which you can walk and watch, just a few metres away, the massive cargo ships making their way into and out of the docks in Melbourne. It's quite a sight |
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Williamstown beach construction project with Uncle Chris, his two boys (Taj and Leo), Kate's Dan, and our two
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Apr 24th - Kate, Crystal, Genevieve and Rebecca, friendship 22 years in the making
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This was Crystal's student house. Well not exactly this but the little old house that gave itself for these nice semis
 | Aussie rules is a kicking, catching and running game. Practice session on the grass at Nelson Place
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| Apr 26th - Genevieve drove us the airport for our short flight to Hobart and took this picture, the latest in our series of us and our luggage at the airport |
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