Superbowl Monday Morning in Melbourne

According to our dinner companions last night, Melbourne has many times been voted the most livable city on earth. This morning we arrived at the wharf to a beehive of activity.  As our ship docked, another cruise ship was following us into the other side of the pier. Dozens of vehicles, including RV's were loading onto a large ferry bound for Tasmania 10 hours away.

Melbourne should be called the city of trams. All trams in the central business district are free In total

there are 250 kilometers (160 miles), about 500 trams, 24 routes, and more than 1700 tram stops.  In order to get from the pier to downtown, we purchased a MYKI card which allows access to routes outside the city centre by tapping on and off. From Flinders Street station we took the City Circle Tram #35 around the perimeter of the city centre with commentary.  This tram was from the Victorian era.

As we will be returning to Melbourne at the end of the cruise portion of our trip, we walked a bit, then took tram 109 back to the pier after a brief stop at a Victorian toilet on Flinders street.

First Day at Sea

We awoke this morning to a bright and sunny day with a very slight chop on the water (wave height one metre). After breakfast we made our way to the uppermost deck where we sat under huge white canvas awnings to watch a glass blowing demonstration. The Corning Museum of Glass has created a complete glass blowing studio where three very talented young artists demonstrated the making of various art works.




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The rest of the afternoon was spent exploring the ship and napping.