Beach Snorkel

Our first snorkel! We went right off the beach in Queenscliff which is on the southern coast of Australia where the water is cold.  We snorkeled in 5mm wetsuits which was nice not only because they kept us warm but they also made us super buoyant.

Swimming along

I found a wandering sea anemone.

Ladies suited up for the snorkel

Barwon Heads

Our week in Queenscliff has been crazy. We have had class or activities everyday from 9-5.  One of these crazy days we spent the morning at Barwon Heads where we explored the rocky shore line in the rock pools while the tide was out. Here are just a few of the pictures from that day.

Red algae in a tidal pool.

Green Algae in a tidal pool

Maori Octopus in a rocky tidal pool.

The most exciting thing we found in the tidal pools was a meter long maori octopus. Normally a nocturnal animal we were very surprised to spot one has it moved its long tentacles around in the small pool. When I saw it peer out from under the rock I decided to take my chances and try to snap a picture.  I slipped my camera into the water and hoped for the best octopus are very intelligent creatures and I was a little worried that this one might try to snag my camera wondering why it was invading its little pool.  Thankfully it did not and I was able to get this picture to share.

Lethbridge Winery

During our time in Melbourne we visited a winery about an hour and a half out of the city.  Lethbridge is an organic and biodynamic winery.  They pride themselves on their very traditional wine making techniques such as crushing the grapes with their bare feet and then aging the wines in French oak barrels that they special order from the French countryside.  

 While there we got to try 2 types of wine, one white, one red.

Hilary making a face at her glass.  She didn't dislike the wine she was just inspection it prior to trying it.

The vineyard was beautiful with its long rows of green vines.  We tried 2 different grapes on our vineyard tour the first was an grape far from being ripe (sour!) and the second was an almost ripe pinot noir grape (much sweeter).

Healesville Sanctuary

Just a few of the amazing animals we have seen so far.  Some of these we have now seen in the wild and some we hope to see over the next few months.

Koala

Wedge-tailed Eagle 

Petting Wallabies 

Pelican 

We saw some of these in Queenscliff. They are huge! We saw them as a fishing boat came in and about 10 of them crowded around to catch the scraps at the fishermen cleaned the fish.

Here's Kanga unfortunately there were no little roos hopping around. 

McDonalds

Fun Times in Class

In our first class of the day we learned about the evolution of invertebrates in Australia. Near the end of the lecture another professor came in with these little velvet worms for us to see and hold.  It was definitely the highlight of the morning.

Passing around the velvet worm to hold.

Ahhh! The velvet worm is crawling on me!

Passing the worm from person to person.

Exploring Melbourne

The boys attempting to navigate Melbourne's public transport.

Laura and Julia (I guess she didn't want anyone to see her face)

Yay for Trams!

Our lovely metcards. They give us access to any public transport for the whole week in Melbourne.

We have arrived!