Craig Michelle Bronte & Josh

Our crossing on the ferry wasn't as smooth as the one at the start of the trip. The boat rolled and swayed at bit through the night, but at least on this journey we got a bit more sleep than last time.

When we were woken up at 5.50 am the boat was already in Devonport - it looked like a grey and misty day. We decided to give breakfast on board a miss - there really isn't enough time as you're expected to be disembarking at 6.30 am. We were the third vehicle off our deck.

Driving down the ramp off the ferry.

We stopped at Deloraine for breakfast and arrived home at about noon. We parked the van on the street outside our house and started the long process of unpacking and cleaning the van.

At home

Today is a bit grey, with blue patches. The temperature made it to 20 degrees.

Today is the last day of our Aussie road trip. Sigh!

We got up late and had a lazy morning. Then we started to pack things up - put away the tent for the last time (sniff) and packed up Bronte and Josh's air mattresses (sniff-sniff).

We are on the Spirit of Tasmania tonight, and will be home by about lunch time tomorrow.

Bronte and Josh are looking forward to getting home and seeing their friends. Bronte says that she is even starting to miss school. Josh says 'she's crazy!'.

Craig and Michelle are a bit sad it's all over as we have had such fun during the last 14 weeks, especially during the first half of our trip when we were heading up through central Australia. Neither of us are looking forward to heading back to work!

Here we are at Port Melbourne before boarding the ferry. We got here in plenty of time, so have parked on Beach Street while we enjoy a drink at the The London Pub before going to line up to be loaded on the ferry.

After our drink we went to line up to be checked in. This is the Melbourne skyline from the queue, waiting to be loaded on the ferry.

There are two queues waiting to be checked in. A man in his car next to us in the other queue had a slight problem with his booking - he turned up a day to early (oops!). He was told he could wait on stand-by to see if he could get on tonight, we wonder if he made it!

After boarding we booked a table at the restaurant (we didn't fancy the bistro to much on our last trip) and offloaded our luggage at our cabin. We then went to watch the Melbourne skyline disappear as the ferry left port before going to have dinner.

Today was grey and showery. The temperature made it to 18 degrees.

Today we took a bus into the city and then a tram out to St Kilda. We had tapas for lunch at a cafe in Acland Street and then a coffee and cake at one of Acland Streets famous cake shops.

Then it was a tram and bus ride back to the caravan park for our last night sleeping in the van!

Today was hot and windy - it got to 28 degrees. The day got cloudier and greyer as it progressed, and ended with a thunder storm.

Today we went to Chadstone.

Bronte has been saving some of her holiday spending money until we got back to Melbourne to buy herself a Build-a-Bear. She chose her bear, picked out a heart (she says its a good one!) and got her bear stuffed. Then she chose an outfit for it. Josh thought it looked such fun that he spent the last of his holiday spending money on a Build-a-Bear too (at least he purchased something other than lego!).

After lunch, and a few other purchases, we returned to the caravan park for a lazy evening.

Today was a lovely blue sky day. The temperature made it to 20 degrees.

Today we went to Prahan to meet Kirrily for brunch. After brunch we all drove to Healsville for an outing. At Healsville we checked out the local market, where Kirrily bought a few plants. We then went for a ride on the Yarra Valley Railway which does a short trip from Healsville to Tunnel Hill.

Kirrily & Bronte on the train ride

After our train ride we went to Rochford Winery where we shared an anti-pasto platter and a bottle of wine in the winery's cafe. It was a lovely day and a lovely location - all very hard to take!

After that it was time to make the drive back to Melbourne.