We finished a 10 day RV camping trip with a one night stay in Healsville, the center of Yarra Valley. The next day we returned the RV in Melbourne and went right back out to the valley with our son and his girlfriend for two more days. We had a great time touring wineries and sampling a wide range of white and reds. For anyone that is familiar with the Okanagan Valley in B.C., the scenery of the Yarra is remarkably the same. Interesting; the wineries have a similar history as the southern Okanagan. Both the Yarra and Okanagan took off in popularity about 30 years ago.

The area offers cheese tasting and wonderful restaurants. We also toured an animal sanctuary complete with many Australian species including the 10 most deadly snakes!! The slideshow gives an idea of the terrain and has a few fun shots of animals.

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Nice surprise: we decided to travel up along side the Murray River. It is Australia’s largest and longer river originating in the Snowy Hill mountains (ski hills !!) to Adelaide about 2000km. We started in Swan Hills a historical town initially growing a fruit industry based on irrigation from the Murray. We travelled down to Echuca, another history river town. Along the way we stopped at Lake Boga and home of a secret World War II airbase. The base serviced Catalina and other large amphibious aircraft.

Gum trees line the river shores and have bark that sheds like a Arbutus tree leaving a smooth multicoloured skin. Wood crafters make artsy products to full furniture sets and cabinets. The wood is red in colour and beautiful.

We elected to do a tourist trip on a steam paddle wheeler and it definitely was worth the effort. It was one of the highlights of the trip so far. There are several ships in working order that were built in the late 1800’s. They still burn wood, generate steam, run extraordinarily quiet and run in a meter or more water. The Murray River is awesome and make sure you take a paddle wheeler boat ride if you are in the area.

We are spending the night in Bright, a ski village in the only high mountain range in Australia. We will travel into wine country tomorrow: Yarro Valley!!

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Almost missed posting a few pictures of the Grampian Mountain range. They are relatively small cluster of mountains that jut out of the prairie surrounding them. It was the hottest days so far with temperatures into the low 40’sC. The mountains are a mix of extremes: waterfalls to burned off hillsides. We travelled from the Grampians to Swan Hills.

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South and west of Melbourne is a drive along the southern coast of Australia. We drove the Great Ocean Road and all one can say is: wow. The coastline is eroding into the Southern Ocean and leaving columns of limestone standing separate from the mainland. A well know group of these columns is known as the 12 Apostles. However, those are just a few of many over 50 kilometres of coast. We spent most of the day walking and taking pictures.

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We are staying with my son in Melbourne. We walked the city several times and enjoyed the diversity of architecture, people, and good food. It is really strange to see Christmas in the southern hemisphere. People in Melbourne love their coffee and baristas are everywhere. If you are thinking of visiting the city, do it!!

I’ve enclosed a short slideshow of a couple of shots in the city and several south of the city in wine country. We enjoyed wine tasting at three great wineries. The trip was organized by my son’s girlfriends parents and they did a great job as tour guides. Lots of fun. One of the shots shows a closeup of a “Morton Bay Bug”, a lobster type animal that is tasty. Other shots show some wine tasting with family and friends. Jill could not resist running around the winery while video Skyping her sister; a beautiful place.

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We are off to Australia to visit family and tour around the country. Our focus will be photography and plan to visit as many places as possible. The trip started in Vancouver and we flew a direct flight to Sydney and onto Melbourne.  The slideshow is a few iPhone pictures along the way. The Sydney Opera House is everything we thought it might be. We attended a matinee concert that was world class and a lot of fun; think Boston Pops.

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