Sunny Melbourne

Sunny Melbourne (yes, really!)

15th - 20th July, 2008

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Text and photographs © David Powell, except where indicated.

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Day 1:
Around Melbourne

Day 2:
Heritage, Parks
& River Walks

Day 3:
Walkabout
city centre

Day 4:
Art Deco &
Melbourne @ Night

Days 5 & 6:
The Shrine, Rialto Tower, Botanic Gdns

Parliament House, Spring Street
Image © David Powell, 2008

Day 3. Today I was going to start off catching the free tourist tram around the city centre, getting off at each stop and taking fotos. That plan only worked up to the first stop and from there it was by foot the rest of the time. First stop was Parliament House. Then walked up along the tram route, past Hotel Windsor - the poshest hotel in Melbourne (and no doubt the most expensive). From the outside ... definitely posh! Princess Royal Theatre .. one of the many theatres across the city centre and claimed to be haunted by an actor who died on stage in 1888. Well Melbourne claims to be the cultural capital of Australia .. and having walked around most of the city centre, I would have to say I'd agree. It's very much unlike any other Aussie city ... it'd be very much at home in Europe. It was multicultural even before the word was coined. Next stop was Carlton Gardens .. famous for the Royal Exhibition Building, built in 1879 by Joseph Reed for the 1880-1881 World Expo and today comfortably sitting in the World Heritage List, along with the pyramids and the Taj Mahal. It is built of brick, bluestone and sandstone (from NSW, which caused quite a controversy at the time), using a combination of classical and Gothic styles. The surrounding gardens were also designed by Reed the lakes doubled up as reservoirs in case of fire). When it was built, the dome was the highest structure in Melbourne. Big, grand, very Victorian and quite beautiful. It was built when Melbourne was riding high as one of the most important cities in the world courtesy of the rich Victorian gold fields - from the 1860's to the 1890's the Victorian economy was essentially based on one product .. gold. Everything else paled into insignificance. And the Exhibition Centre screamed out all of that wealth. Majestic in a word. It certainly deserves sitting alongside the Taj Mahal. AFAIK it's also the only site in Victoria that's on the World Heritage List.

Lost hangbag, Bourke Street
Image © David Powell, 2008

Next step was the Old Melbourne Gaol. Some of which was demolished when it became obsolete, most of it taken over as part of a university campus. The remainder ... the men's wing, became a museum. It was, unsurprisingly, a very emotional place. Full of anguish, depression, hopelessness ... and hope. Skipped the guided tour (I didn't have the time) and instead wandered around myself. Lots of small and dark gaol cells ... just large enuf in some cases to be called a closet (even smaller than certain hotel rooms!). Gloomy, eerie. There was even the execution block where many criminals ended their days ... rightly or wrongly ... a very solid beam hanging over a trapdoor. A total of 135 prisoners met their end, timely or not, in the gaol, the most famous (or infamous) being the bush ranger Ned Kelly who, for non-Aussie readers, made suits of armour for he and his men to protect them from police gunfire. The gaol opened in 1843 and by 1850 it was already overcrowded. A new cell block was added in the 1850's, completed in 1858, and it is that cell block which remains today (and houses the museum). The original cell block was on the site now occupied by the old Watch House. An ironstone wall is all that remains. The courtyard between the surviving cell block and the Watch House once housed a two story hospital, morgue and jury room, all built in 1860. At one stage the gaol covered an entire city block with cell blocks, exercise yards, hospitals, a chapel, bath house, staff accommodation and of course the governor's residence. But even at that, the gaol was just part of an even larger complex comprising the City Court and the Police Watch House. The later two remain intact and are part of the same university campus that has swallowed up most of the gaol's surviving buildings. The gaol itself closed in 1924. Life was harsh - prisoners were locked in small, solitary cells for 23 hours a day. They were allowed one hour a day outside to exercise, change their clothes once a week and attend chapel on Sundays. They were also forbidden (on pain of whippings) to talk with other prisoners and were gagged when they were outside of their cells. Well behaved prisoners were moved to the next floor and were allowed greater freedoms. The upper floor with its much larger cells was reserved for VIP prisoners.

That was as far as I got on following the tram route. Had to head back south to the Town Hall ... I was booked for a tour there early in the afternoon. Had a quick lunch on the way and then the tour. No foto's allowed courtesy of September 11th ... at least that's the excuse they gave. The Town Hall is actually three buildings ... the old part built in the 1800's. The new part built in 1910 and the main auditorium which replaced one that burnt down in the 1920's. The merging of the old and the new parts was so carefully done that even expert eyes could not spot it from the outside without it being pointed out - two of the people on the tour were architects working for the same firm that built the 1910 extension & they couldn't spot where the old joined the new from the outside. 'Tis a small world. The new council chambers are quite elaborate, very rich ... built from gold ... figuratively, that is, not literally. Alas no foto's were allowed. Some of the highlights of the 90 minute tour ... seeing the piano and hearing it played) that Paul McCartney played when the Beatles were in Melbourne back in the 1960's. The very expensive silver tea set the council bought for the visit of Queen Elizabeth ... only to have her ask for an orange juice when they offered her a cup of tea. Whups! The portico where many famous people strutted their stuff before the great unwashed in decades past .. royalty of all sorts (those who inherited a crown and the royalty of popular music). Missed seeing the grand organ, one of the largest in the world. It's in the auditorium where some cosmetics company was having a seminar.

Finished off the afternoon walking some more of the city centre I'd not already seen, loosely following the inner city historic walk, the "Historic Golden Mile", tho' it's a wee bit more than a mile, either according to the shoe leather or as the crow flies. The Immigration Museum (from the outside), the Gothic bank (which well and truly lives up to its name). The Scots Church and St Michael's Uniting church on opposite corners. Both impressive and, well, large. Finished the day's explorations walking the length of Melbourne's Chinatown ... which is basically one street with some side lanes going off it. Still, the street is quite long so it's a decent sized Chinatown full of Chinese restaurants, shops, mission halls and the like. And lots of little lanes - mind you, the main street of Chinatown, Little Bourke Street is maybe 5 metres wide - enough room for a single car to drive down, dodging the parked cars. Melbourne's Chinatown dates back to 1850 and is one of the oldest in the Western world.

Spring Street ...