I am seeing so much of the lovely state of Victoria and my Uncle Mick's wife Margaret, particularly, is a great source of ideas for excursions, zooming us off here, there and everywhere in her little car. She takes me for a quick scoot around St Kilda, a cool and quirky neighbourhood not far from the centre of Melbourne. We are distracted by a colourful community garden called Veg Out, which tells you more about St Kilda than I ever could.
We do a quick circuit of Luna Park fairground and marvel at the oldest rollercoaster in the country. Surely the rickety wooden structure can't support a train full of funsters? Apparently it can, though it's not operating today so Margaret and I can't put it to the test, much as we'd love to. Hmm.
We take in the foreshore and as town beaches go it's unpretentious and fun with all kinds of activities going on... kite flying, dog walking, even swimming. But it's cake o'clock and Acland Street, lined with cafes and bakeries, is calling. We choose the Monarch, a Jewish bakery, as many of them are in this area, and I order Chocolate Kooglehoupf and a cafe latte. It's the oldest cafe on the strip, I think, and we get chatting to the owner, who has now handed over to his sons.
Another day Margaret and I drive down the Mornington peninsula. We stop in Mornington first, which has a pretty main street of cafes and and boutiques and a striking beach backed by red cliffs. Then we move on to Arthur's Seat, a well known national reserve and viewpoint. We manage to make out the Melbourne skyline, some 60km across the bay. Arthur's Seat's Aboriginal name is Wonga. I'm not sure which is better. It was a base for the Boonerwrung clan for whom it was a pretty useful way of seeing who was coming and going. There are information boards about how the plants growing here were used (nappies made from bark, anyone?) and yet again the land management of the Aborigines is praised – they way they sought to maintain the ecology for future generations and only took what was needed. Before we go, I can't resist being snapped in Arthur's actual seat.
We move on to the achingly picturesque seaside towns of Sorrento and Portsea at the very tip of the peninsula, via Blairgowrie and Rye... I have to say, the place names here just mess with my head. It's like being in a parallel universe where there are things you recognise but they're all in the wrong sequence. It's vaguely unsettling.
Not to be outdone, Mick hosts a day out (albeit on the way to a Hash) to the Heide Museum of Modern Art in the north-east suburbs. I can't say enough about how fabulous this place is. Originally the home and 15-acre gardens of John and Sunday Reed, a Bohemian couple with cash, who were early adopters of all the new trends in art, architecture and self-sufficiency. Their home became a hub for artists such as Sydney Nolan and in 1963 they commissioned modernist David McGlashan to build them a new home, a 'gallery to be lived in'. I skip delightedly around the place, loving the buildings, the art, the sculptures in the grounds. I think, I hope, Mick enjoys it too.
My last day trip is spent in the Dandenongs, a range of mountains east of the city, which at its cooler elevation features towering forests of Mountain Ash and lush fern gulleys. We have coffee and cake in Sassafras but not in Miss Marple's Tearoom thankyou very much. I notice that some of the street poles are wearing leg warmers. Yes, there is a proper chill in the air.
In another town called Olinda, there's a shop with a flock of sheep made from scrap metal, just the thing for a rustic garden. Talking of gardens, nearby is one of the loveliest, Cloudehill, tumbling down the hillside with formal gardens and herbaceous bordery at the top (where Mick's choir once performed, he says) to a wilder rainforest of historic cool-climate trees at the bottom. It's very nippy indeed. One of the plants I lean in to photograph has ice around the petals, which means I've about half a suitcase of skimpy togs that won't see the light of day for a while. Brrr.
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