Melbourne 1st Sunday - Royal Exhibition Building & Aquarium

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06 Jan 08

Woke up to a nice Sunday morning. The weather was taking a turn for the better. I decided to take a walk (via the blue line) to Carlton Gardens today, where the Melbourne Museum and Royal Exhibition Building was.

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Map of the day: (Blue) Walking route, (Red) City Circle Tram route


Some little cottage as I entered Carlton Gardens


State School opposite


Looks like an Eastern Orthodox Church


First look at the Royal Exhibition Building. The only World Heritage Site around here.







All very nice. Little did I realise that I was going to walk by this everyday for two weeks starting from tomorrow.


The IMAX theatre is next to the museum

The nicest thing I saw in the Melbourne Museum is this skeleton of a whale. Actually the museum is more like what I know as a science centre -- less of old artifacts and more of how things work. Luckily for me, entry is free. Some interesting things to note are that there are some cross-section slices of a real human and a reasonably explicit reproduction exhibition. Apart from that I got bored really quickly and decided to take the free City Circle Tram (via the red line) to the Melbourne Aquarium.

Here comes the tram. Off I go!


Arrived at the aquarium, entry costs 17 AU with a student card


Purple cuttlefish. I didn't know they were purple.


Some fishies


Sea horses, sadly it is tough getting pictures of these water animals.


Some sort of armoured lobster?!


Ugly snake-head fish; somehow I got the feeling they get eaten by us.


Stick insect; not everything here is from the sea


Small erm... shark..


Mirror mirror on the wall...


Who's the creepiest of them all?


Floating plastic bag


Actually it is an infant jellyfish


A whole bunch of special jellyfish that lie up-side-down on the sea bed


Yes I know you, you taste good!


Onward to the super big deep sea aquarium with super big stingrays and sharks.


These guys are huge, but the stingrays are so big they can take on the sharks anytime.


That's some nasty teeth!


That's a small mouth. They look like they are smiling from the underside.


The stingrays easily dwarfs all other fish here.


See the huge stingrays swimming around


Sharks, stringrays and a turtle


Fly-by of a stringray


Shark fly-by

That was probably the best aquarium I ever visited. Nevermind the size of the underwater viewing area or that the place not being the biggest aquarium I have been to, what matters the most is the size of the animals, there are some huge things in there! After leaving the aquarium, I took some pictures and caught the City Circle Tram to the Docklands.

Crown Entertainment Complex, where the casino is


Section of the Yarra river


All sorts of food here


Another semi-old looking building


Ah! The Docklands


I was expecting more yachts


Sunbathing on the yacht


Some kind of public art. It pains me that we are starting to make these things back home as well.


That must be the river cruise


The Telstra Dome in the background, where Spencer Street station is. Apparently they changed the name of the station to Southern Cross Station, but nobody likes the new name.


Buildings opposite the docklands



Finally lunch! It is almost 3pm and I am famished. All these for about 14 AU.


Hopped back on the City Circle Tram and got off at La Trobe Street



Walking back, I decided to bypass Queen Victoria Market.


Unfortunately they close at 4:45pm on Sundays. Well, I'll be back.


I'm near the graduate house


A row of old houses

I wanted to skip dinner but my stomach thought otherwise. Here is a "2 piece chicken feed" for 7.15 AU from KFC. I must say the chicken is quite small. After the oily dinner I decided to call it a day. Tomorrow will be my first day at the Eye Research Centre and I hope to find it on foot without getting lost!

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