Melbourne Museum, VICTORIA
Airing Date: Jul 10th, 2006
Where can you explore a forest, come face to face with spiders, a giant squid and an Aussie legend race horse? Well, it all happens here, at the Melbourne Museum, an interactive learning paradise, especially for kids.
The Melbourne Museum is the largest museum complex in the southern hemisphere.(the complex consists of the Melbourne Museum, Scienceworks and Immigration museum).
Spread over six huge levels (half of which are below ground level), the museum draws on the latest technology to give an insight into Australia's flora, fauna and culture.
The Bugs Alive! exhibit is fascinating and allows visitors to get up close to the microscopic world of insects. You can smell things, touch things and put your head inside an ants nest!
There's also plenty of live bugs on display- including giant burrowing cockroaches and an ant colony- so visitors can see the ants at work and an awesome collection of spiders- definitely not for arachnophobes!
We all love dinosaurs, and at the Melbourne Museum they have 5 Dinosaur replica skeletons on display. You can actually touch the thigh bone of a 140 million year old Apatosauras (this one lived during the Jurassic period).
Also , you can't come to the Melbourne Museum without taking a look at our Aussie racing icon- Phar Lap. During his racing career, Phar Lap won 37 races, including the Cox Plate twice and the 1930 Melbourne cup.
He became a national hero, and his death in California America in April 1932 was shrouded in mystery and conspiracy theories.
One of the museum's most striking exhibits is the Forest Gallery, a living interpretation of Victoria's tall temperate forests, which features around 8000 plants from more than 120 different species.
It's also home to more than 20 different vertebrate species, including snakes, birds, fish, frogs and hundreds of different insects. The Forest Gallery is located in the heart of the Melbourne Museum.
As visitors walk inside the ultra-modern main entrance, visitors see the stunning vista of a lush fern gully flanked by the soaring canopy of dozens of tall forest trees, through gently wafting mist.
FURTHER INFORMATION
Admission $6 Adult. Kids under 16 are free. Open 10am - 5pm. Prices correct at 10/7/06.
www.melbourne.museum.vic.gov.au
2 nights at Ibis Little Bourke St. $134 a person twin share. Subject to fluctuation. Conditions apply. Includes $100 hotel credit voucher. Travel by 31/8/06. Prices correct at 07/6/06.
Qantas Holidays - Ph: 13 14 15
For Further Information on Victoria: www.lonelyplanet.com.au
