I have only been in Melbourne a couple of days, but have already found a favourite spot. The Eureka Skydeck is very much a perfect spot to enjoy views over the city. Today I am here overlooking the MCG, Rod Laver Arena, National Gallery and Federation Square awaiting the sun to set. I am getting the inspiration to write this post and filling in the time until I can photograph the city by night.
But of course, I am getting ahead of myself because it is later in the day right now and I have so much to share from today. It was an early start this morning with a 6 am wake up to allow time to get ready and make my way to Federation Square. I had booked a tour included with the See Melbourne Card, called City Sights that had an early start. The below image of the Melbourne Cricket ground was one benefit of the early start.
City Sights Tour
I quite enjoyed the tour this morning it seemed to be quite comprehensive and included good commentary. There were two stops included on the tour, the first at Fitzroy Gardens and the second at The Shrine Of Remembrance.
Fitzroy Gardens
The stop in Fitzroy Gardens was not expected, but it was nice to get a little introduction to the gardens. The gardens are the location of Cooks Cottage, which is on my list to visit tomorrow. I spent a little time wandering the gardens just to see what is here.
I had not previously thought of visiting the Shrine of Remembrance, ore so because I did not know about it. That is what tours can sometimes be good for, showing you new places. The visit was quite interesting and informative, it is much bigger than the Shrine in Brisbane. To give you some idea of size, there are 121 steps to reach the top balcony, which is worth a visit for the views.
About half way up is the main room, which includes a plaque with the words “GREATER LOVE HATH NO MAN.” The design of the building is such that the word “LOVE” will be lit by a ray of sun on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. It does not accurately happen though due to Day Light Savings Time. As such it is artificially recreated every half hour for everyone to see.
Photos
Throughout the tour, it turns out I took nearly 300 photos. There are plenty that did not turn out due to the moving bus. However, by the end of the tour, I have worked out some settings to help alleviate this. I have just shared a few above and may share some more later once I have a better chance to look through them.
ANZ Banking Museum
After the tour, I was out for a walk through the city and came across the ANZ Banking Museum. It was free to enter so I decided to take a look and see what I could learn. The museum is located in the ANZ Branch on Collins Street. The building itself is rather interesting and has been named the Gothic Bank thanks to the architecture used.
Melbourne River Cruise
It turned out that I had some spare time this afternoon and decided to find where I could do a river cruise. A cruise on the Murray River is something that had been on my list, but not yet planned. I just had time this afternoon to take a down river cruise, leaving from Southbank and going down towards Docklands. It did not turn out to be quite as interesting as I had hoped, but still a good experience. I will look at doing the up river cruise later in the week, if time permits.
Eureka Skydeck
As mentioned at the beginning of the post I finished the day again at the Eureka Skydeck. I primarily wanted to visit tonight to get some pictures after the sunset of the city. Earlier in the day, I had managed to buy a small tripod to help out with getting steady photos.
The below photos include The Customs Museum, Flinders Street Station, Federation Square and The Melbourne Cricket Ground. They all do take on a little bit of a different look by the night time lights.
That rounds out today in Melbourne for me. I hope that you have enjoyed this post and do look forward to sharing more tomorrow. I have a few interesting stops planned so hope you can stop back tomorrow.
