![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1.jpg\")
<\/p>\nmany people will probably rather violently disagree with me about this statement but coming from sydney there is really no reason to stop in melbourne (this is of course exactly how canberra became the capital of australia\u00a0when it should have been sydney all along). there i said it, throw your stones. in my defence: when i ask people why they like melbourne they generally mention the shopping and the eating – not my kind of entertainment.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
coming from a place like this why would we want to visit a metropolis with about 4 million inhabitants?<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-8.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
the reason we did decide to pay this place a visit was to catch up with friends and that is definitely the best reason one can think of; i’d make a detour to see them any day.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-1.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
while i had lunch with some friends from work nat and kris went to see the melbourne museum. the building in the photo above is actually not the museum, however, kris did only take photos of this in my opinion rather less interesting royal pavillion which unfortunately obscures the actual museum when you approach it from the city.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
they have a real little forest complete with its inhabitants in there; this bower bird is clearly delighted with all the blue treasure it scored which it will use to decorate its nest. i’m unsure if he’s going to have many female visitors, full marks for effort though.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-3.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
inside they stick to less lively creatures with which they seem to successfully attract visitors. female ones, too.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-4.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
cameras through a lens. who is looking at whom now.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-5.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
the quintessential australian dream. we are living it now – a slightly updated version that is.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-6.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
progress is in the eye of the beholder.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-10.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
painted in a corner.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-7.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
in many ways museums are great places to relax, particularly when you step into these rooms from the streets of a boiling hot busy city. fewer people, peace & quiet, air conditioning and generally good coffee.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-9.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
one of our friends set up our meeting in the perfect place: a german (! – no, definitely not austrian) cafe on mount dandenong, complete with ‘sound of music’ performance and the ‘blue danube’ waltz played on a harmonica.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-11.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
quick, let’s grab that pretzel and run away!<\/p>\n
the singing was not impressive …<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-12.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
… but the mountain ash definitely were. these are massive trees and unbelievably tall. nat and i know that as proper mountain bikers we have to be into trees, so i’ll say it again: amazing trees!<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-13.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
nat has been looking forward to this for at least 2 months! i’m not kidding, ben! she has been asking all the time when we would go to meet you (and drive go-karts).<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-14.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
she had a blast around the track. clearly the skills are transferable, look at the eyes focussed on the corner exit! that’s my girl.<\/p>\n
our next stop should have been phillip island. nat was very keen to see the penguin parade; she had been there a long time ago when she was really little and can’t remember. fair enough. however, the parade is booked out for the next month! we called the whole p.i. trip off and went to st kilda\u00a0where instead of a minimum of $25 (you might see little black & white spots from afar) or a more realistic $50 per person you can see the little penguins\u00a0for free. yep, free. and from a shorter distance, too.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-15.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
now that’s a nice photo of the\u00a0melbourne\u00a0skyline from st kilda. not bad. i mean it’s not the harbour\u00a0but you can’t have it all (more abuse coming my way now,\u00a0i guess).<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-16.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
and here is proof there are little penguins in st kilda. don’t bother going to p.i. people, unless you want to see a tourist parade.<\/p>\n
thanks for all your hospitality dave, sabine, andrew, lily, don, steve, ben & jen! we might not stop for melbourne\u00a0itself but we will always stop to see our friends!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
many people will probably rather violently disagree with me about this statement but coming from sydney there is really no reason to stop in melbourne (this is of course exactly how canberra became the capital of australia\u00a0when it should have been sydney all along). there i said it, throw your stones. in my defence: when… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9642,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[18,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-our-blog","category-the-long-way-round"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/oz_trip_3-1-8.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7MvER-2vE","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9650"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9655,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9650\/revisions\/9655"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zo-zo.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}