Wildlife Sanctuary

At 6:30 this morning Jimmy, Raeshawn, Francisco, and I set out for the gym before work. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time as we thought we would and I ended up doing a quick 20 minute circuit… I guess something is better than nothing!

After working out, we showered at the office, ate breakfast, and then were ready to start our day. My four team members, my two WPI advisors, and 3 employees from the office set out for a day-long tour of Melbourne.

We drove around the outskirts of the city and gained a better understanding of the area, which is important for the project we are working on. After about 2 hours of driving, we decided to stop at a little cafe for a quick cup of coffee. In Australia, you do not just slurp down a large Dunkin’s iced coffee when you need a quick fix. We stopped, sat outside, and drank latte’s from little glass mugs. They were tiny but very delicious – definitely better quality than at home.

Also, you cannot just order regular coffee here. It has to be either a latte, a magic, or a cappuccino apparently. Luckily for me, I love lattes. My teammates aren’t overly enthused about this.

After our lattes we piled back into the bus and continued driving. We drove out through the Yarra Valley wine country and it was beautiful. The entire WPI group is booking a Wine/Chocolate/Cheese tour to do on Sunday, so luckily I will have more time to visit there and take pictures. 🙂

Next, our group stopped for lunch at a small bakery in the country side. I had a BLT which was very good, but dessert was the best. I don’t know what it was called, but our sponsor ordered us these cake-like pastries dipped in chocolate and coconut. They said that they are an Australian tradition and I can definitely see why!

We were under the impression that lunch was one of our last stops on the tour, until we pulled up to a Wildlife Sanctuary! Our sponsor surprised us with tickets and we spent the rest of the day looking around and seeing all of the animals.

The first thing we saw were Koala bears and they were just ask cute as I imagined. This is probably the animal that I was most excited to see, but I wish we could have pet or held them as the staff was.