Tour by City Circle Tram, Melbourne

Touring around Melbourne by the classic old "W class" City Circle Trams, which connects the main attractions in Melbourne's Central Business District, is joyful . The highlights of the service are:

1. the "hop on, hop off" service is offered completely free of charge throughout the year except on Christmas Day and Good Friday,
2. the recorded voice announcement explains about each attraction very clearly as the tram travels,
3. free handouts are available with valuable tour information, and
4. the service also linked with the major rail-way stations of Melbourne's city loop, making the service accessible for those staying/living in the suburbs.

Classic 'W' class trams on City Circle

Trams run in both directions approximately every twelve minutes between 10am and 6pm Sunday to Wednesday and extended hours, 10am - 9pm Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Clockwise service: Flinders Street > Harbour Esplanade > Docklands Drive > La Trobe Street > Victoria Street > Nicholson Street > Spring Street > Flinders Street (source: www.metlinkmelbourne.com.au).

Key attractions that can be reached by the City Cirlce service are:

1. Parliament house of Victoria
2. Windsor hotel
3. Carlton Gardens
4. Royal Exhibition building
5. Imax theatre
6. Melbourne Museum
7. State library of Victoria
8. Melbourne Central station (and Coop's shot tower)
9. Queen Victoria market (need to walk a bit from the tram stop)
10. Flagstaff Gardens
11. Victoria Harbour
12. Waterfront city
13. New Quay
14. Ethihad stadium
15. Docklands park
16. World trade center
17. Melbourne Aquarium
18. Rialto Tower (Melbourne 360 Observation Deck)
19. Immigration museum
20. Flinders street station
21. Federation square
22. St Paul's Cathedral
23. Treasury gardens

Here are some of the shots I took during my short tour for 3 hours covering few of the attractions. And, I am planning to explore all the attractions soon.

Web of tram power lines

View from Harbour Esplanade

Victoria Harbour

Car sale at Waterfront city

Ethihad stadium

New Quay

Flinder's street railway station

Federation Square

A Horse caravan

St. Paul's Cathedral

Additional tips to Tour around Melbourne:

1. City Tourist Shuttle Bus is another free service in Melbourne's CBD. The route of this bus service is slightly different from that of City Circle Tram and covers some attractions that are not covered by City Circle Tram such as Royal Botanic gardens, Shrine of Remembrance, Queen Victoria Gardens, etc.
2. All public transports in Melbourne only support Myki from 29-12-2012. No more tickets on-board the trams.

For maps and info:

1. City Circle Tram (source www.metlinkmelbourne.com.au)
2. Melbourne City tourist shuttle (source www.thatsmelbourne.com.au)

Other pages of Melbourne:

1. Birds of Melbourne
2. Smile of Nature in Melbourne

NB: This page is updated in January 2013.

Bird Photography

One of my favourite genres of photography is bird photography as I admire these beautiful creatures entertaining us with their songs, joyful and swift activities, colours and shapes. Though I consider myself an amateur in this area, I have learned some essential skills of the trade over the last few years.

Being a nature lover I love to watch and photograph birds in their natural habitats. Though it is generally harder to photographs birds in the wild when compared with shooting them in aviaries or cages, the great experience of interacting with the nature itself is great. 

The following are the essentials of bird photography.

1. PATIENCE. Hours and days of waiting, returning with no worthy photographs are not uncommon in bird photography.
2. Knowledge about birds such as bird families/species, their food, behaviours, habitats and migration patterns, and the environment like places of fruiting trees, water resources and perches.
3. Sharpening the senses, especially sight, hearing, and smell.
4. Getting close without spooking the birds -
• Understanding birds' body languages to identify whether bird/birds is/are alarmed by our presence or movement
• Moving slowly and smoothly
• Lowering the apparent height (kneel/crawl if possible)
• Avoiding movement straight towards the bird, and moving in a zigzag manner
• Wearing camouflaged clothes (colours that go with the environment)
• Using blinds (existing places to hide / portable blinds / cars)
5. Timing: weather, season and time of the day are important factors to consider. Morning and evening times are the most suitable for birding in general.
6. Practice with the camera to use the necessary controls swiftly.
7. A fast camera with quick auto focus and burst mode. Manual focus would certainly be an added advantage.
8. Telephoto lenses with focal length of 400mm or more are generally used by professionals. Extender/teleconverter tubes are also used to extend the effective focal lengths.
9. Flash with Fresnel lens extenders are useful to have sufficient light levels and/or to increase the shutter speed under dark conditions. 
10. A monopod or a tripod based on the movement requirements. It essential that the head of the stabilizing device allows smooth movements in all the directions with ease and has a quick release plate. For those who wish to wait for birds behind the blinds a tripod is ideal. On the other hand, for those who move around a monopod is very handy.
11. A good camera bag and/or photographer's vest to store and retrieve your gears with ease while on action.
12. Avoiding (whenever possible) taking photos of birds against harsh light in the background.
13. Learning composing skills such as rule of thirds and applying whenever possible.
14. Having a pair of binoculars to locate birds from the distance.
15. Staying alone or in small groups, away from crowded and noisy areas. A mate who has the passion of birding would make the day successful.

Here are my captures with very basic photographic gears.

See also

• Birds of Dandenong Ranges
• Birding at Royal Botanic Gardens, Melbourne
• Birds of Melbourne
• Common birds of Jaffna
• My albums on birds in Picasaweb and Flickr
• Butterfly Photography

மேலும் எங்கள் ஊர்ப் பறவைகள், யாழ்ப்பாணம்.

Smile of Nature in Melbourne

The smile of nature is evident in Australia's garden city, Melbourne despite the water usage concerns. Royal Botanic Garden of Melbourne is one of the attractive places in Melbourne for nature lovers with a vast variety of plants, lush green lawns, water habitats and birds.

See also Birds of Melbourne.

PS: For foreigners arriving from tropical countries, this garden may give little bit of disappointment. Due to the harsh climate and water conservation requirements, the garden has got comparatively lesser number of green plants and flowers, when compared with well known botanical gardens of some tropical countries.

Birds of Melbourne

With about 800 species of birds including many endemic species, Australia is a blessed land for bird watchers. One interesting fact I noticed is that the birds I saw in Melbourne are used to the presence of human, and can be approached quite closely. The following are my first few shots of birds in Melbourne. More to come.

Eastern Rosella

Red-rumped Parrot

Red-rumped Parrot

Rainbow Lorikeet

Red wattle bird

Red wattle bird (landing)

Crested Pigeon

Spotted doves

Starling

Raven

Australian Magpie

Magpie-lark (Pee-wee)

Willie Wagtail

Pacific Gull

Silver Gull / Seagull

Common Black Bird

See also

• Bird photography,
• Birding at Royal Botanic Gardens, Melbourne and
  
• Smile of nature in Melbourne.

Golden Birdwing Butterflies

Golden Birdwing (Troides aeacus) is a large beautiful butterfly, with a wingspan of 120mm to 190 mm, occasionally seen in the nature reserves of Thailand. For long time it was one of our most sought target and we had many failed attempts to click this butterfly as it was seen flying at very high altitudes (beyond our lens' reach) every time we encountered. Our continuous effort finally rewarded with this shot when my friend Prem located this pair from a moving vehicle and promptly asked the driver to stop, during one of our nature tours in Thailand.