I was very fortunate indeed to have a personal guided tour of the Melbourne Tram Museum by a friend who is probably the leading historian of Melbourne's excellent Tram system and all things 'Melbourne' in general. I thoroughly recommend the Museum to anyone interested, it is very well presented and very interesting indeed! This visit was then followed by a journey around Melbourne on several current tram lines, and I was really fascinated by some of the features that were pointed out, such as the remnants of Melbourne's early Cable Tram System.
Up until relatively recently, prior to the extensive use of concrete, the areas around the actual tram rails was filled in by what looked like bricks, but in actual fact was wooden blocks, usually Red Gum. I can remember as a child that we got a load of these as they became redundant for use in our fireplace, the problem of course that we now realize is that the wooden blocks were often soaked in tar, which when burned is carcenogenic, but such things were not known then.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, part of the old Hawthorn Depot which houses the Tram Museum still uses these 'Tramway Blocks' as it's flooring, which I found very interesting!
After a beaut evening meal in Fitzroy I was off to what is now Southern Cross Station to watch a steam special depart. I have many great memories of this station from my childhood, when it was simply known as Spencer Street Station, and was the terminus for all the Country and Interstate trains, which it still is. The loco for this Steamrail special was supposed to be one of the magnificent R class locos, but ended up being a K class, still very impressive, of course. So a very interesting evening ended with the loco chuffing it's way into the darkness on the way to Bendigo and Swan Hill, a super end to a really excellent day!
The next day we headed to Phillip Island, specifically to see the Penguins come back to their nests at dusk, which I found really interesting, on a really superb Winter evening. It was really great to be outdoors on this beautiful and wild coast.
The opportunity to visit the area just east of Phillip Island was taken and I really enjoyed the area generally. A surprise was the State Coal Mine at Wonthaggi, which is now an interesting museum, where we had a beaut lunch. To burn off the calories we then walked along part of the Bass Coast Rail Trail between Kilcunda trestle bridge and the site of Anderson Station. This line had primarily been built to transport the coal from the Wonthaggi mine to Melbourne, mainly to fuel the steam locos, but served the needs of the agricultural community too.
Of course we went the 'wrong' way along this line, with a fairly steep climb up towards Anderson, but it was really good fun on a really nice day. I really enjoy walking along rail trails!
So, all in all a really great weekend, and now I'm back into the painting of my Trainbarn at home, greatly refreshed and encouraged.
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