Great ocean road tour

Stopped at airey's inlet for coffee and morning tea. Light rain.

Just stopped at apollo bay hotel for lunch. Very nice fish and chips

Tuesday

Just went out and did some more window shopping and sightseeing today.

I have been looking for a small suitcase that is small enough as carry-on or can be locked and checked. I was looking for one that a good exterior pocket that the laptop would fit in. I finally found one that I really liked.

Melbourne has turned on another wet day so I came back to the hotel and had lunch in the restaurant and then confirmed the bookings and pickup for the Great Ocean Road Tour I have booked for tomorrow.

Wine Tour

Went on the Yarra Value Wine Tour today.

We visited four Wineries during the day. The first was Yering Station (Yering is the region of the Yarra Valley).

The guide showed explained the steps in wine tasting. We had about 45 minutes at that winery.

We moved on to Balgownie Estate Winery. We had seven wines to taste here. After the tasting we had lunch in there restaurant. A mix of Americans, British, Portuguese , Italian and Australians on the tour (20 people).

The next stop was Yering Farm Winery. This is a much smaller operation and they don't sell to many place except restaurants and door and mail order sales. Some of there wines were in my opinion some of the best. The best thing they had to taste was not wine but there apple cider. Haven't had such a lovely cider in years.

The last stop was Domaine Chandon for a tour of the winery and a visit to the Riddling Room where the wine is stored during fermentation and it is rotated to collect the yeast in the neck of the bottle.

It was about 14 degrees and we had wine tasting and cheese and chutney.

As we were about to leave an almost tropical storm hide us so we waited till it started to ease off so we could run to the bus.

Got some wine to pack to bring back with me. The Winery was selling a very neat solution (Wineskin). It is a thick bottle shaped plastic bag lined with bubble wrap and a watertight (wine-tight) seal at the bottom to prevent leakage if there is a breakage.

Changed plans

Was going on a wine tasting tour today but got a call from company asking if I could go tomorrow instead.

As that was fine I have been window shopping in Melbourne. Bought a few small items and resisted others (especially books). There are too many book shops in Melbourne. I didn't want to buy any more books as I still need to sort out my current collection.

Just having a coffee at the Queen Victoria shopping centre.

Lords of Time 2

Had a great time today at the convention.

The first talk of the day was Charley Hayes and Nev Fountain. The names might not be familiar but they work for Big Finish and also Charley is Wendy Padbury's daughter and Nev is Nicola's husband.

Had photos taken with

Deborah Watling
Wendy Padbury
Frazer Hines
Richard Franklin
Mark Strickson
Paul McGann
Daphne Askbrook
Nicola Bryant

Wendy,Deborah and Frazer gave a very entertaining talk about working with Patrick Troughton

Had lunch at the table with Nicola,Richard and Deborah

Richard Franklin talked about his career before and since Doctor Who.

We then had Nicola and Mark talk about there careers

The last talk was Daphne and Paul.

We then went to collect our autographs from the guests.

Lords of Time 2

After a quiet day I went to the opening events at the Lords of Time 2 convention.

After collecting my tickets I went to the cocktail party.

Got to meet

• Paul McGann and Daphne Ashbrook  who were in the 1996 Doctor Who Film.
• Deborah Watling, Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury who were all companions to the Second Doctor (Patrick Troughton)
• Richard Franklin who played Captain Mike Yates during the Pertwee era of Doctor Who.
• Nicola Bryant who played Peri Brown with Peter Davison and then Colin Baker.

A nice area so people could circulate and talk (No loud music).

After the cocktail party Daphne Ashbrook performed some songs. After a small delay caused by 'Windows Media Player not responding' problem the concert was great.

Looking forward to tomorrow.

In Melbourne

Bit bumpy on approach to Melbourne, but not the worst conditions (That was at Canberra) I have flown in.

Very low cloud cover at Tullamarine.

The reason the plane was late into Hobart was that a thunderstorm hit Melbourne while it was loading luggage.

I am glad that my luggage is hard shell design as every soft bag that came out on the carousel was very wet. The  baggage tag on my luggage was soaking wet. I am very glad I bought this suitcase. It has survived a lot of travel in the past two years with only a few scuff marks.

Waiting at Airport.

Arrived at Hobart Airport early after dropping off the car at the parking place. The flight is delayed 25 minutes due to weather in Melbourne. QANTAS Club is packed with people waiting for this flight.

I am looking forward to the Doctor Who convention on Friday night and Saturday.

Booked myself a Yarra Valley Wine Tour for Sunday and a Great Ocean Road Tour for Wednesday along with planning for some shopping and a visit to the shop that I bought the 3D printer from.