After a rather long and sleepless night on the plane (most uncomfortable journey I have had on a plane), we arrived in Sydney, to then miss our transfer flight into Melbourne. No one had told us when we arrive at Sydney we would have to pick up our bags to then check our luggage in again to get the flight to Melbourne!! Luckily they put us on the next flight free of charge, as our flight into Sydney was a bit delayed.

We arrived somewhat knackered into Melbourne, where we were met by a guy called Andrew, a friend of my mums whomwe stayed with in Melbourne. He lives just outside the city centre in a place called Northcote , so it was nice and easy for us to get into the centre by just getting on the tram at the end of his road! There is quite an extensive network of Trams in Melbourne, which are really useful for getting around the city. Much preferred it to the bus! That evening we arrived, we all went to the cinema, Charlotte to watch Twilight, and Ed and I watched Toy Story 3, which rocked! The following day we just spent the day meandering about the city checking out the shops and having dinner at a great burger bar! The following day was much the same, bit more shopping and meandering. Mostly we were trying to get used to the temperature change, as coming from Asia, it was minimum 28C and Melbourne was about 10C, so it felt rather like the ice-age! At one point I was wearing 8 layers! That afternoon Ed hit some of the art galleries in the city, whilst Charlotte and I hit the Melbourne Museum, which was cool , especially as we got in free on our 'student' status!

The next day we spent with Andrew as we all went to see an Aussie rules AFL (Australian football league) game at the Melbourne cricket ground. The teams playing were Collingwood versus St. Kilda, St. Kilda being the favourite to win, but Collingwood won, taking them to the top of the league that day! Was a very heated match with around 80, 000 people in the stadium. Was good fun to watch. It is a bit like rugby, but much freer and there are a number of additional people running about thepitch, known as runners who run on and off to give the players out in play messages, personal or professional! Bizarrely at the beginning of the game in the hype up to the opening ceremony, they bought out Neil Robertson, who was the winner of the world snooker championships 2010, and drove him around the pitch for everyone to cheer him on! Then just before the players of each team come onto the pitch, they bring out massive flags of each team that have been made by club members, for the team members to run onto pitch through, ripping the flag in half! That evening we headed out to met a friend of Charlottes from school, who had moved out to Australia a few years ago. He bought a few friends of his along as well, and we had drinks , they took us around the south bank of Melbourne and to the casino. We did n't gamble our millions away as they are just a little precious to us at the moment, although I am sure had we have done, we would have made lots of bucks. Personally I fancy my chances on the roulette table! Just outside the casino, are some very large metal structures, which onthe hour every hour during the evening, suddenly start throwing out flames from the top of them. The heat given off from the flames is intense. You can feel the heat from the other side of the river. There are a number of these metal pillars dotted along the southbank, that when they threw out their flames, all did so in a coordinated show along the bank. It looked cool and the heat was welcomed in the cold!

The next day we were back in town checking out the Victoria market, which happens every weekend and one weekday. It had allsorts, from food all over the world, wines, fruits, veg, souveniers to doggy incontinence pants! The next day was even more cultured as we drove down with Andrew to Pin Oak, also known as Ramsey Street, the set of Neighbours! They unfortunately weren't filming whilst we were there, but the houses looked exactly as they do on the TV. Whilst we were there, there was a guy who as soon as he clocked us arriving, made a sharp exit out of the drive he had been hanging about in, to stand behind one of the trees until we left. We all knew he was there, as you could see his feet at the bottom of the tree, but he did not come out from behind the tree for the whole half an hour we were there! The afternoon was exciting as we all went to get our haircut! An event in itself. After 3 months hair growth and the harsh climate of Asia, it was a shocker for the hairdresser. The girl we booked our appointments with clearly thought mine was a state and allocated me to the senior hairstylist!

All beautified with our new crops, we strutted our stuff the following day with the wildlife of Philip Island, 2 hours south east of Melbourne. Here we visited the working farm, saw a super hairy horse who had cooler hair than me, turkeys being rounded up by sheepdogs and milked a cow! We then moved on tot visit the Koalas sleeping in the trees. Whilst in that part we also almost walked past a group of wallabies who were about 2 meters away from us, but they were completely undisturbed about us getting so close! We then took a walk around the Nobbies, a set of rocks just off the sea shore and the most southern part of Philip Island. Supposedly there are seals chilling out on these rocks, but we never found them!

The last part and most exciting part of Philip Island, was watching the penguin parade, that happens each night just after sunset. These penguins are not the normal penguins, but called little penguins, because they are little! They are about 20cm tall and navy blue in colour on their backs.