Well, we had our biggest sleep-in of the trip this morning. We all stayed in bed until 7.30am, although I jumped up at 6am to turn on the heater, and it took that long for the icicles inside the caravan to melt. Yes folks, it's still bloody cold. The rain has eased to scattered showers, and the sky is still very grey and sombre and threatening, but it won't stop us doing what we want to do, we just need to rug up against the cold and wind. We headed into town after breakfast, to go and watch the Anzac Day service (not the dawn one, were not psycho crazy), as we haven't been to one for years. Can't remember the last time, actually... The service and the march past were excellent, very poignant and moving... makes you think...

Ballarat is more a city than a town, and very rich in history and heritage. The buildings are incredible, and while many places have one or two such buildings to conserve and enjoy, Ballarat is full of them. An incredible history from the pioneer gold rush days, right through the war years, and into more recent history. They've managed to preserve and keep much of that history intact, and it's great to see it all in such good shape. We enjoyed a cup of coffee (no, not at a bakery this time, just a standard cafe), and then went for a drive through the city streets. We ended up at Lake Wendouree, which is Ballarat's recreation precinct, and if you know Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra, it's exactly like that... A large lake, with bike and walking tracks all around, botanical gardens, cafes, playgrounds... You know the type of thing... Lovely place to spend an afternoon, and enjoy some quiet time... if it's sunny!! It wasn't sunny, it was grey and windy and cold, so while we pretended to be having a lovely time, all we really wanted to be doing was sitting in a movie theatre somewhere watching the new Avengers movie in 3D!! Instead, we all sat on an old, restored Ballarat tram for a 15 minute tourist ride around the edge of the Lake. I shouldn't sound too skeptical of it though, it was fun, and the type of thing you only do when you're a tourist, and you want everyone to know you're a tourist. The old tram museum was worth a visit too. It's on the edge of the lake, and is operated purely by volunteers that work to preserve the history of the trams, and that's another example of what makes this city great. The dedication of volunteers that won't allow their history to disappear into their past.

On the way home from our exploring, we had to do some grocery shopping, which reminded the boys they had money that hadn't yet been spent, which led to the unnecessary kind of shopping that resulted in more of that sort of crap they buy and use twice and then move onto other crap. In this case, that meant another Nerf gun each!! Now we've got a caravan that's full of Lego on every vacant shelf space, with glow-in-the-dark foam bullets flying around all over the place... I'm coming home for a holiday...

Happily, that's not true!!