Monday, December 24, 2007

DAY 80: Day 1 off in Melbourne

Mon 24th December 2007
no cycling!
Cloudy, cool, light showers AM again; sunny in afternoon


Had an amazingly long sleep of 10 hours at John and Marjorie's last night. I have a lovely comfy bed and the area is very peaceful, even though there is a tram depot just behind the house.
John took me up th road to where one can buy a ticket for the tram, but they had sold out, so he gave me detailed instructions how to use the ticket machine on the tram. This worked OK and it cost me $6.30 for a ticket to use all day, anywhere.
It took about 40 minutes into the city and once there I walked the 4 blocks up to the Old Melbourn Gaol, which I wanted to see particularly in context with Ned Kelly, having read that he was hanged here for murder of a policeman or three. This is a fascinating place; apart from the Kelly connection there are many insights into life in the prison during the many years it was used. You could really spend a long time if you looked a everything; as it was I spent a good 3 hours in there. An additional attraction is the mock session demonstrating the 'processing' of a person charged with an offence, whereby about 20 punters had to go through being booked, searched, put in the remand cell etc. by a very aggressive police 'sergeant' who frightened some of the younger people to death. All good fun.
After this I headed over to the Botanic Gardens and had a pleasant wander during an increasingly sunny afternoon, taking lots of pics as usual.
I headed back to J & M's about 6 after a very enjoyable day.







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