Marvellous Melbourne

 After a very good flight with Virgin Australia we arrived in Melbourne and were straight out for a very nice Italian meal. 

We had to be up early as we`d been allocated an early 7.30 breakfast at the Vibe Hotel. Seems they were unable to cater for the size of our total Imagine Cruising party and had to release a conference room for a "group " breakfast". I tried to explain we had not travelled as a group and could we eat later downstairs but to no avail. Instead we listened to British guests moaning about the lack of toast and marmalade. Little did they know the biggest setback was yet to come!

On the tourist front we took the free old tourist tram that circled around the city centre. Again all transport within the centre was free! 

After that we used the advice from Andrew in Sydney and found a guided walk along the lanes and arcades of Melbourne where we could admire local street art and historical shopping centres.

The stained glass work in some of the arcades was lovely

In some ways it was remeniscent of the Leeds arcades back home. My favourite bit was the street art as ever. So much to see.

Finally saw a koala

Of course on the way the walk advised of a coffee and cupcake and a cocktail stopover. Who were we to argue!

Margaritas at mid day

A very cool container bar

Art in the toilet here even

Next it was off to the Skydeck Tower for another 88th floor view of the city. Great fun.

Next it was a walk around Melbourne by the river in this packed day.

Getting back to the hotel we got the disappointing news that we had hardly expected. In the middle of the night in Kuala Lumpur as I`d struggled to sleep through jetlag I had read in a forum that we would not be going to the fiords or the Bay of Islands on our New Zealand cruise due to hull fouling. Basically the New Zealand government had enforced long existing rules about biosecurity and did not want the moluscs and debris attached to the hull of the cruise ships to enter their protected waters. Cunard had known about this since Novemeber as two of their cruises, amongst a dozen others, had been barred form their waters. They had made one attempt to clean the hull and failed. I`d been writing to them since December asking for guarantees and the issue of refunds if the worst happened to be assured that there was no reason to expect such changes.  In KL I wrote again saying my worst fears had come to pass and they had offered 20% furue cruise credit and $600 onboard spend as compensation which I had rejected as pitiful as I no longer wanted to go to NZ with them but had no choice. In Melbourne they advised that we could not enter New Zealand at all after more discussion with the government.We were given the chance to cancel with a full refund or to continue with a different cruise on the Queen Elizabeth up the eats coast of Australia. Not only was this a better option for me given what was left of the original New Zealand cruise but we could have this cruise with the $600 onboard spend, 50% refund on cruise cost and £500 off a future Imagine holiday. A handful of people left the cruise and booked cars to travel around but I`d not brought my driving licence so no chance for us. Thus we went for the cruise which will be the next  and final blog of this trip. So no New Zealand for us but we had travelled from Perth to Sydney and Melbourne and would now be going up the coast to Brisbane and Cairns as well as seeing Sydney for another day.