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Oz Experience Tour to Melbourne
15th - 18th September
To get to Melbourne we had a 4 day tour through the countryside and mountains on the good old Oz Experience. To our surprise we got the same driver that we had between Byron Bay and Taree. So that was good news as he was our second favourite of the whole trip so far. It's a good job too as the other 5 passengers were all German speaking girls.
Our first stop was Canberra, Australia's capital, a planned city from the ground up that gave the place a very clinical and regimented feel to it, but it was very calm, pleasant and green for a city. We saw the main sites including the grand War Memorial and New Parliament House, both aligned on the city's central axis. We continued up towards The Snowy Mountains, where we stayed at the serene Lake Jindabyne - a product of a huge damming and hydroelectric scheme undertaken in the mid 20th century.
We went up to a ski resort called Perisher where it was the very very end of the season and very little snow left. But we had fun tobogganing down an icy, rocky slope, before the group gained 2 injuries and we thought we should quit before someone got seriously hurt! We came back down the mountain and tracked the scenic Snowy River for a few hours. It was a beautiful day, leaving us a little confused by the naming of the river, as there was no snow in sight.
The next stop provided us with a bit of an adrenaline rush, as we had a go at zip-wiring across a valley and over a lake! Hope you enjoy the action shots, courtesy of our awesome driver, Gollum. We also got to see some farm animals and even fed some little lambs! We spent the night at a Buddhist retreat where we took part in some meditation and they fed us very well.
The next day we continued south to Lakes Entrance, where we took a river cruise to a very friendly winery for some wine tasting. After a dodgy mixture of wines, we had some lunch there before continuing to Foster. We stayed the night at a typical caravan site, with all 7 of us crammed like sardines into a cabin!
The last day, we spent the morning in Wilson's Promontory National Park, the most southerly point of Australia. We did some great walks along the rugged coast and up into the hills. The highlight was seeing hundreds of kangaroos in a field where we managed to spot some Joeys in pouches! We continued to Melbourne in the afternoon managing to avoid rush hour traffic.
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