pab1974

Hi there

We are coming over to Melbourne this Friday to validate our visas but also to try and make it as much of a family holiday as we can for our kids, aged 6 and 4.
We are staying in Mornington.

Just wondering if this is still a viable arrangement with all the devastation that has occurred from the bush fires?

I dont mean to sound selfish but I wouldnt fancy taking the kids somewhere that may be a disaster zone.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Weirdstone

Stay down in Mornington/Peninsula region ..no fires there, and day trip to Melbourne. But be prepared for electricity outages ...there are still fires threatening power supplies to the north and east of the city.
Keep an eye on the CFA website which will tell you of regions at risk.

jad n rich

As before you must check to update where the fires are currently burning, ( be aware they might keep buring for a while yet, its not just a one day thing, can go on for weeks). Also know where not to go, some areas will be blocked off or dangerous, for eg, at Xmas we were in healsville a popular tourist spot, for the past few days it has had fires.

The news is pretty full on right now, might be best with such young kids to handle the remote control some of the images are not nice and are being played over and over.

When you fly in, melbourne was already severely brown and dry, now it could be very smokey too, we flew into sydney in bushfires and the kids were similar to yours in age then and found it a bit scary, seeing so much smoke from the plane, just be prepared to distract them, answer any questions.

There are pleny of areas not affected, but it changes so the most important thing will be to keep up to date with whats going on.

At least the temps down there are cooler now, should make things a bit easier, but they are expecting temps to rise again early next week, but to the 30's not the 46 etc!.

Edit. this is the link for the melbourne age, should have plenty of info to help keep you up to date on weather, fire areas etc. http://www.theage.com.au/

pab1974

Thank you, both, for the great advice.

Many thanks.

furkew

Heres a few links worth looking at as well regarding fire info :

http://mapvisage.appspot.com/fires/FireMap.html

http://www.cfa.vic.gov.au/incidents/...nt_summary.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/melbourne/radi.../774stream.ram

Mornington has had a few small spot fires, but nothing of a serious nature.