January 14 - Another trip around the city

Seth went back to work and I took the family to the big city! We had our first experience with 3 young ones on the tram along with backpacks and a double stroller. My goodness, that was difficult. It got better with time but the first one was a funny one!

Since we left a bit late and we didn't have a real plan, I thought I would take everyone down to the visitor's center and they could have a look around. Our tram goes right down by the center but there was a demonstration of some sort and the tram was rerouted. No biggie, I thought, we'll just get a bit of a walk. Well, it went a little further away than I thought and we did a bit more walking than I bargained for but we were going to walk all day, what was a little backtracking? In the end, it worked out well as we were able to walk along the Yarra River and it would be pretty much our only opportunity to do that.





We stopped for a bite to eat at a food court that I have been to a couple of times before.



With our bellies full we headed over to the Visitor's Center. Unfortunately I don't have much luck getting very good information from them. This was no exception. We found a map for a self guided tour of the Royal Botanic Gardens and thought we could kill a few hours doing that.

But wait, we had to stop and have a beer first.



Jaime had a couple but his favorite name was from the Moo Brew. I had tried this once before (I believe in Tasmania where it might be from) - ordered specifically for the name.

There is a really cute children's area in the garden and the kids got to run around and get a bit wet.




Finally we pulled the kids out of the water and headed into back into the main part of the gardens.




We tried to go on this self guided walking tour but it seemed the map we had didn't really match the paths that we were walking along. The signage was different in the park and we just got completely confused. As soon as we saw a main road we ended up walking along it instead of through the garden. Somehow we made it back to our tram and headed home.

We made dinner, put the kids to bed, and played a little Mario. That game is hysterical when you are trying to complete levels with four people. We got a good laugh and there was only a little yelling at each other.