melbourne culture

After many weeks in Melbourne, we had seen many of the sights and experienced many of the Melbourne Activities, however, two important things were missing, the Melbourne Museum and Footy! We wandered north of the city center through the gardens and parks near the Royal Exhibition Center to the Melbourne Museum to experience a wonderful collection of native animals, creepy crawlies, and sea creatures, walk through a forest exhibit with many birds chirping, and see a wide variety of other special exhibits on the body and mind, the history of Melbourne, and Australia's aboriginal culture.

Royal Exhibition Center

Inside the Melbourne Museum

After enjoying the day at the Melbourne Museum, we walked the South Bank along the Yarra River. It was a lovely evening and there were tons of events along the waterfront including more food and wine festival events and promotion for Australia's Grand Prix Formula 1 race happening over the weekend. We enjoyed ice cream and dinner (in that order) and then headed to Etihad Stadium to meet Jen and Torby for our first ever footy game with Torby's favorite team, Collingwood. It was nice to have our resident footy experts with us explaining the rules of the game (definitely one that should become popular in the US), though unfortunately (for some) and fortunately (for others) the score was not very close and the purple team (Freo) won by a wide margin.

Formula 1 Car

Footy Collingwood v. Fremantle in Etihad Stadium

Saturday brought the race warm-ups, and Mom and I headed down to Albert Park to hear the Formula 1 cars racing around the racetrack (which could be heard from far and wide) and even peek the lights for a fraction of a second as they zoomed by our section of the track. Before the final warm-up we got to see and certainly hear the jet flyover before the rain hit and we headed home to pack for Tasmania.

Gates to the Grand Prix Formula 1 race track

For more pictures, visit the Melbourne Part 2 Album.