Melbourne

Larry and I caught a ride with Rosie Timmins on the 20th from the Gold Coast to Melbourne, where she is from. Google Maps says the trip was about 1700 some kilometers or a little over 1050 miles. With three drivers we did the 22-hour drive as smoothly and easily as could be done. Rosie's parents also very graciously opened their house up to us for as long as we might need, and it has been invaluable to have yet another base from which to determine our next moves.

Our next moves, however, are still unknown, even after being in Victoria for more than a week. Most of Australia writes off the Thursday through Monday of the Easter weekend. Tuesday was also taken off this year because Easter Monday fell on Anzac Day, the Australian Memorial Day. Thus, businesses have generally been closed until a couple days ago. We've looked into more farm labor jobs such as fruit and vegetable picking or packing along with warehouse and factory labor. The biggest problem is that most require a car to get to them, which we still don't have. We have a lot of emails and resumes floating around out there at the moment though, so hopefully something will surface.

The Timmins brought us along on a day trip to an old mining town called Walhalla on Monday with several other families. The hilly area and the town itself reminded me a lot of Virginia City. We had a barbeque to finish out the day. I enjoyed seeing parts of Victoria that I probably wouldn't have seen otherwise.

The Timmins live in the suburb of Croydon, northwest of central Melbourne. Larry and I have made the 45-minute train ride a few times to explore and get a feel for the city. Our immediate impressions brought our thoughts back to Seattle and San Francisco, and later of New York. Melbourne is a very hip, multicultural city, yet to me feels more welcoming than Brisbane. It has a tram system that runs throughout the central business district. Most of the main streets have sights typical to any large city, but narrow lanes and alleys are everywhere and are much more interesting. The whole city has a lot of character, and a large part of this charm seems to be in these tiny lanes.