Milawa Gourmet Region & Healesville Sanctuary

We left Albury and travelled to the Milawa Gourmet region famous for its wine and cheese. We stopped at Famous Brown Brothers Winery for Cappuchino and Chocolate muffins, and had a fabulous wine tour! This is definitely the Fulbright Culinary trip! We passed through the Great Divide region - and we are now in the State of Victoria. Our lengthy bus trip took us through beautiful mountains and cow/ sheep herding land. We stopped at Healesville Santuary where they have an interactive zoo and an animal hospital. They actually perform surgery and autopsies here - and it's open to the public. It has a total environmental educational slant, and we were able to pet kangaroos and wallabies. They were so cute and cuddly! We saw a bunch of Joeys in their mom's pouches. I saw a dingo - without a baby!! We then finished up in Melbourne - which is by far the most beautiful city I have ever seen. It has a beautiful Victorian and modern architecture blend over looking the river. Our Novotel is in the "France" section because of all the posh shops around us. Tiffany's is across the street from us. We are able to walk to everything because we are so centrally located. Today we went to the "Ceres Community Environment Park" for a tour and lecture. They are a community based park that is self sustaining, and we had lunch with all their home grown products. (Still a Culinary theme!.
We then went to the State Curriculum Board where we were able to purchase textbooks for our curriculum projects. We wound up over at the Victoria Market place with hundreds of food and retail stalls. Interesting inexpensive stuff! Tonight we are going to a Fulbright alumni dinner near our Hotel in China Town - and our 93 year old restaurant owner/cook was Mao's cook at one time.
Blog me back - make sure you check out the other 2 blogs I wrote about in my earlier blog. They are the blog experts with great pictures. Talk straine later to ya - Fair dinkum?? G'day!