Photos of Melbourne, capital of Victoria, Australia

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Melbourne, capital of Victoria

The State Capital, Melbourne, is the second largest city of Australia with a population of around 4 million and lies at the northern end of Port Phillip Bay, Victoria's largest natural harbour. It straddles the Yarra River and is a city of broad avenues with elegant Victorian buildings and trams that trundle through its streets. It is cosmopolitan city with many immigrant communities. Since the days of the gold rush, the centre of the Chinese community in Melbourne has been Little Bourke Street. It remains the centre of "Chinatown" with its traders and restaurants. Another important place of commerce, for over 130 years, is Queen Victoria Market, a sprawling collection of sheds and buildings between Elizabeth, Victoria, Franklin and Peel Street.

Melbourne's skyline
 
Chinatown gate
 
Melbourne CBD
 
Canoe training
 
Williamstown beach
 
Flinders Street Station
 
Federation Square
 
View to South Bank
 
Centre Place alley
 
Caf�s in Centre Place
 
Block Place
 
Block Arcade
 
Manchester Unity Building
 
St Michael's Church
 
View to Melbourne CBD
 
Chinatown
 
Queen Victoria Market
 
Portrait painter
 
Clothing shops
 
St Patrick's Cathedral
 
William Wardell's statue
 
In St Patrick's Cathedral
 
Stained glass windows
 
Dolphin Fountain
 
Sinclair's Cottage
 
Cook's Cottage
 
In Cook's Cottage
 
Model Tudor Village
 
Federation Square
 
Architectural contrasts
 

Melbourne was established in 1835 by free settlers from Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania) and was named after the Second Viscount Melbourne, William Lamb, two years later. Queen Victoria declared it a city in 1847 and it became the capital of a separate colony, bearing the Queen's name, in 1851 when it separated from New South Wales. It was one of the richest cities in the world by the 1880s as a result of gold mining and was the seat of Government of the Commonwealth of Australia until 1927.

Central Melbourne offers great views along the Yarra River, the stately façade of Flinders Street Station and, in total contrast, Federation Square, an abstract steel and glass set of buildings and new focal point of the city. There are cosy coffee shops along narrow streets in Central Place and beautifully preserved Block Arcade, a shopping arcade built in 1891. Melbourne has many churches and lays claim to one of the world's finest examples of Gothic Revival architecture with St Patrick's Cathedral. Building started in 1863 and the spires were added in 1939.

There are many more examples of great architecture, all within easy walking distance. The city centre is divided from East Melbourne by the Fitzroy Gardens, a quiet respite from city life. In the gardens stand the well preserved home of James Sinclair, who was head gardener in the 1860s and 1870s and the home of Captain James Cook's parents, originally built in Yorkshire, England, in 1755. It was dismantled, shipped to Australia, re-assembled in Fitzroy Gardens and officially opened in 1934 to celebrate Victoria's centenary. Captain Cook's cottage is furnished and decorated the way it would have been around 1750. The southern suburbs of Greater Melbourne stretch along Port Phillip Bay, like Williamstown with its popular beach.