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Melbourne
Melbourne is after Sydney Australia's largest
city and the capital of the state of Victoria that is home to
over 3 million people or 26 per cent of Australia's population.
Although Melbourne is built around a harbour like Sydney, it has
not got the world famous landmarks like Sydney's Opera House and
the Harbour Bridge, but is known for its gardens, parks, Victorian
buildings, its multicultural population, great shopping and thriving
cafe scene.
Like Sydney is built around its harbour, Melbourne is built around
Port Philip Bay, with the Yarra river further dividing Melbourne
in two halves. The city centre, also known as the Central Business
District or CBD , is located on the north bank of the Yarra River.
The city is named after Lord Melbourne who was the British Prime
Minister at the time the city was established.
Melbourne skyline seen from the Yarra river
Melbourne started out as a large plot of land bought
from local Aborigines of the Dutigalla tribe for flour, tools
and clothing by John Batman ( no relation to the lifesaver in
the movies) in 1835. This was the second attempt at settlement,
it had been abandoned by the first settlers who had arrived in
1803 and then departed to Tasmania after staying for less than
one year.
By 1851 the population had already increased to 80 000 people
and six million sheep were grazing the surrounding country, and
the place that had so far been considered part of New South Wales,
was now officially declared as the British colony Victoria. It
became the largest and richest settlement in Australia as a result
of its proximity to the vast goldfields of Ballarat and Bendigo
and a large number of gracious homes and commercial buildings
were built that can stil be admired today. In 2004 the Royal Exhibitions
Buildings and Carlton Gardens were placed under World Heritage
listing in recognicition of European settlement as part of Australia's
cultura heritage.
The discovery of gold in November 1851 made the
town boom and by 1854 the colony's population had grown from 80
000 to 300 000, in 1856 more than 86 tonnes of gold was mined.
This established Melbourne as Australia's main financial centre.
It was a very prosperous city until the Great Depression in the
late 1880s.
It is easy to find your way around Melbourne as
the city is laid out in a grid system but if you're driving watch
out for the trams. The centre of the city is the Bourke Street
Mall which is situated between Swanston Street and Elizabeth Street,
running in a north south direction, Bourke Street and Collins
Street are the main roads running west to east.
Melbourne is a cosmopolitan city and has the
largest Italian community outside Italy and the third largest
Greek community outside Greece so you can be assured you can
find a decent cup of coffee here ( which can be near impossible
in some of the more remote parts of Australia).
Melbourne is famous for the annual Melbourne
Cup horse race and changing the slogan on cars numberplates
from 'Garden State' to 'Victoria-on-the-move' and on the move
they were, thousands bailed out every year to start a new
life in sunny Queensland, later an improving economy changed
this trend.
While having a bit of a reputation for not always real glorious
weather with many Australians, Melbourne retained its position
as the best city in the world to call home in the London based
Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU)'s survey in 2002. In 2005 it
still ranked nr. 2 out of 130 cities surveyed worldwide. Melbourne's
big advantage over the other capitals was its climate, the study
found. The London-based EIU assessed the level of hardship for
expatriates in the 130 cities, using 12 factors including housing,
education, recreational activities, health, climate and terrorism.
Also, despite Sydney being the home of the annual Gay Mardi Gras,
the gay.com website declared Melbourne the No. 2 place to visit
on a list of top 10 international destinations beause of the city's
bars, theatres, cuisine, parks, skyline and gay-friendly attitude.
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