We made it to Melbourne after travelling on the inland roads through country NSW and country Vic. We stayed in an inner city caravan park for a bit more than a week. Inner city parks are never as nice as country parks but it suited our needs for the time we were there. We had decided to upgrade our caravan which we did as it is going to be our permanent home for a while.

While we were there we visited my Aunty Simone and my cousin Diana and some of the family. Again we were spoiled with tea parties, fun and laughter.

Melbourne was in a state of grand final madness. We went into town and were completely bewildered by all the traffic and the people. We have become such country bumpkins its scary! While we were driving on our way out of Melbourne Chris drove onto a tram track. All we saw was a train looming down on us. Luckily he just managed to drive the car and the caravan over a rather high kerb and we escaped a tram collision! Our hearts were in our throats. We can blame Mrs Navman as it was her idea to negotiate inner city Melbourne roads with a caravan. Never again!!

Melbourne is a great city with its beautiful buildings, museums, Queen Victoria Market, parks, shops and excellent trains. I would love to stay there a bit longer and explore all the suburbs around the city. It was freezing cold, wet and grey while we were there. The temperature never got higher than 15 deg and most nights it was about 2 deg. Everyone has been loving the rain though as it has been dry for a long time.

After leaving Melbourne we spent 2 days at Philip Island which is beautiful. We loved riding around the place and even managed to ride our bikes over the bridge joining the island to the mainland. We visited the Grand Prix race track - had to do that!!, and went to see the famous march of the fairy penguins from the ocean to their burrows. It was amazing seeing these tiny little penguins waddling a long way across the beach and then find their burrows in the dunes off the beach. Humans can only be in awe of their daily journey to the sea for food in the morning and then back home again at night to feed their little ones. They do this every day of their lives.

We then drove down the Great Ocean Road which must be one of the most beautiful ocean drives in the world. Again it was freezing, and at times very wet and grey but when the sun came out intermittently it was beautiful. The caravan park we stayed in was across the road from the beach and had koalas in the trees. This is one of our favourite caravan parks - we discovered it the last time we travelled on the Great Ocean Rd - Kennett River.

Along the way we stopped and walked through a beautiful rain forest before heading home.

Yes, we are on our way back to Perth!

We have all sorts of things to do in Perth so will be there for a few months before planning our next travels.

We have LOVED EVERY MOMENT of our first time around Australia. We will have travelled about 30,000km. There is still SO much we want to see and we will definitely continue our discoveries at a later stage.

I'll continue some blogging as one never knows what's around the corner!!!