Victoria
Victoria (VIC) is Australia’s smallest mainland state covering just 227,600 km². Even so, it still manages to be bigger than England and Scotland put together. If it were a country, it would be in the 84th biggest in the world, just ahead of Guyana. It is slightly bigger than the American state of Minnesota.
It has a population of around 5.3 million people and because of its size, this makes it the most crowded state in Australia. It is known as “The Garden State” and residents are known as “Mexicans”- a reference to the fact that they live south of the border.
Victoria has some fine attractions, but surely none can be better than The Great Ocean Road. Over 240 km of twisting, turning, cliffside, seaside, bushside driving that will make your jaw drop. It also has Phillip Island and their famous Penguin Parade.
Places in Victoria
Melbourne is the capital of Victoria and the city is well known for it is performing arts; it also has a reputation for being unconventional. This is reflected in Victoria’s list of famous Australians originally from the state; Germaine Greer, feminist; Steve Irwin, crocodile hunter; Nick Cave, revolutionary rock legend; Barry Humphries, satirist; Shane Warne, cricketer; Rupert Murdoch, media mogul and Ned Kelly, outlaw and murderer.
Oh, and Kylie Minogue.
Here is a list of towns and localities in the state, with a population of over 10,000 people.
- Geelong – just over 137,000
- Ballarat – just over 78,000
- Bendigo – just over 76,000
- Shepparton-Mooroopna – about 39,000
- Melton – nearly 36,000
- Mildura – just over 30,000
- Sunbury – nearly 30,000
- Warrnambool – - about 28,000
- Traralgon – nearly 22,000
- Pakenham – - about 19,000
- Wangaratta – nearly 17,000
- Moe – over 15,000
- Ocean Grove-Barwon Heads – about 14,000
- Horsham – about 14,000
- Morwell – around 13,000
- Sale – around 13,000
- Bacchus Marsh – just over 13,000
- Warragul – nearly 12,000
- Bairnsdale – about 11,000
- Colac – - about 11,000
- Lara – around 10,000
- Drysdale-Clifton Springs – just over 10,000
Then there are many more towns with less than 10,000 inhabitants, more will be added in time. If you live in any town or suburb in Victoria, now’s the time to find out how you can Own Your Town on this website.
{ 25 comments… read them below or add one }
Vic(e)torians us Mexicans? That infers youre going to a hotter place. We are definitely not as hot as Queenslanders. It also infers were touched by heat, which we definitely are not. (though our state won the hottest capital award for a while, a few years ago).
I would sugges the fact were called Mexicans because we can and you guys cant…
This means war, unless you remove the reference as us being mexicans. We have been trying to improve Queensland, (Tourists) by supporting your lack of inteligence there ie , building homes in flood prone areas, having Joh Bjelke Petersen as Premier, and tryinh to ruin our nations artesian basins by allowing GAS exploration and screwing up with water management. but calling us mexicans. Bob delete that passage at once, or I wil fill your mail box with all sorts of nice requests, and things that you didnt know you could do to yourself… Grin: John Vance
Ah, I’m glad you showed up. I’ll have a bottle of Corona, my good wife would like a margarita and when you have a moment, could you rustle us up a couple of fajita’s?
You will want them with worms Eh?
Eh Pepito, there’s a guy here who want to be deported to Me he co. Did ya bring se bolero’s He’s crafty und qeeck. Mucho diniro fo yu eef you catch heem qeeck…
I got papers!
I sincerely hope you are joking John, he is right of course. And queenslanders are ‘Banana benders’ if i recall
Us Queenslanders can also be known as ‘cane toads’ too. Not sure which I prefer, but I do know that John is joking. He does it a lot.
We burn em. You ref u gee!
I’ll pour water over your flame! (I’ve got a feeling this could go on a bit).
Youre wrong. EEt finished. We both clazy!
Who you calling clazy! Oh, eet finished? Oh.
Cheers mate!
The second half of spring and first half of Autumn are good weather times in Victoria. Summers and winters are extremes. But on the cost of living it’s not bad here. Victoria and South Australia share the cheapest living standards in Australia. There is a border between Tasmania and Victoria so you missed which is the actual “Mexico” state!. Bob, Imagine living in the 19th century in northern Victoria when there were horses and hosre-carts as mode of transport in extreme weather both hot and cold. Police in them days has to go out across the land to attend to troubles. it’s a rotten occupation that turn them into arrogants. There once was a settler Mother’s Daughter who refused a Benalla policeman’s advances towards her while he was supposed to be out looking to arrest her brother for “horse-stealing”, but her brother was nowhere within the vicinity. The Policeman cracked and after taking the long ride back to Benalla on horseback he lied to the authorities which resulted in the loss of the said settler Mother’s property leaving her and her family without a home. The family in question were the Kellys. This gave rise to the Kelly gang. The Stringybark incident was that the Law on horsebacks (From Mansfield) were charging (galloping) on their horses and shooting with fire-arms at the same time, thus firing the first shots at the Kelly gang before one of the Kelly gang members fatally shot one of the charging constables. This puts the constables on a murderous intentional mode whereas the Kelly gang were on a defensive mode. Ned Kelly and his gang had the utmost support of all the citizens and settlers around northern Victoria (even back from the time when that arrogant Benalla constable ruined the Kelly family’s livelihoods which showed the arrogances of the law as a consequence) right through to the aftermath of the Stringybark incident and through the Glenrowan seige (where the Kelly gang’s body armor and helmet were first worn and consequently the massacre of Ned’s Gang and the capture of Ned himself) and through many generations ahead the next century.
I haven’t yet fully looked into the Ned Kelly thing, but I do know that some people think he was nothing but a murderer and others say he was a hero. I think I know which side of the fence you sit on, Col. B.
I will certainly look into it at some stage, thanks for your account.
Can’t help but wonder why they called it the good old days, some of those old days were pretty tough!
Living in Kelly country, Wangaratta, and a stones throw from Benalla and Glenrowan, we know all about Ned Kelly. See website >http://www.ironoutlaw.com/html/history_01.html < History has it that some of the Kelly's turned to law and some are still practicing in both South Australia and Victoria.
Injustices by Police (who were often Ex Convicts themselves) were said to be rampant.
A fight with Ned Kelly and four constables who tried t ohandcuff him, ended with Ned's "family jewels" being severely injured. Ned swore he'd shoot the Policeman who did that. He did exactly that a year later when attacked. No onewould dare call Ned a Mexican!
On the plus side, they didn’t have speed cameras and RBT’s.
I think every country went through its “Wild West” days, Australia is no different by the sounds of it. Ned Kelly is clearly a bit of a hero for most people, rather than a crook. Didn’t realise he died so young though, just 25!
As an aside: On RBT’s you have to wonder if some of the “crooks” are now runing the show… http://blog.motorists.org/its-just-a-decimal-point-the-dirty-secret-behind-breathalyzers/
Seems higly suspect…
Oops! Dang it! Put the decimal point in the wrong place. Oh well.
Yes, very disturbing.
I am a lawyer myself – very much against any outlaw – but also am a historian and a proud Australian. Ned Kelly represent the Australian spirit – fairness and mateship, justice and fraternity of the people. Calling him murderer is hurtful to Australians.
Britain has her Robin Hood, Americans their George Washington. Washington succeeded against the colonials and is celebrated officially; Robin Hood kind of succeeded amongst the masses – so remains a celebrity in popular ballads. Ned was murdered – but his spirit of fairness and mateship succeeded eventually, and so Australia is free and a welfare nation.
Well, the votes keep coming in for Ned Kelly. Sounds like he was a good guy.
I suppose we have to realise that in those, kind of “wild West” days, murders did happen more regularly. Situations where you either kill or be killed. Both Ned Kelly and Robin Hood were probably quite good at being the survivor in those situations and probably both had a good heart.
So they go down in history as murderers, but also as heroes.
Maybe Ned was responsible for the “give a bloke fair go” attitude in Australia. Fair dinkum!
It should be that your profession is proud of Ned Kelly. Some of their relatives seem to have (taken up robbing people blind by) become lawyers and one became a judge. Also possibly a distant relative.
Such is life.
Thanks for the realisation. But, no – we don’t call Robin Hood or Ned Kelly murderer, just as we won’t call George Washington or Abraham Lincoln murderers, even though actions by all of them involved people being killed. They were heroes – well-respected amongst the people they sprang from as they stood for a “fair go” for those people (Robin, George, Ned) – or part thereof (Abraham), which is not the case with murderers.
Who do you mean by “we”? There are plenty of people who do refer to Ned Kelly as a murderer.
As I wrote before, some “Police” in those unruly days were actually x convicts who were worse than the criminals they were supposed to apprehend. But you cant give those who were supposed to uphold the law a bad name. Kellies sister was said to be raped by one of them, and another in a fight, (5 against Ned)did some damage to Neds family jewels. and Ned swore he would kill that ungracious man. He did one year later in a gunfight.
Ned did what he had to do, with stories about him wanting to overthrow the government of the day because of the unfairness of way of treatment settlers got from government agents. Being mainly Poms from the old country, with old country attitudes (remember Bligh?) he found no sympathy when he complained. He was after all Irish, which were despised by them.
Then that settles it. He was innocent. (I am of Irish descent, my grandad on my father’s side was Irish. We gotta stick together.)
Just a reminder to Andy on a few facts that may have escaped his attention. Robin Hood is a purely fictional character, and that of the tens of thousands of Irish who landed in Victoria , Ned Kelly and his merry men are the only ones I know of who chose to rob and murder ( Irish born constabulary, Kennedy and Scanlon). like all legends, it’s flawed and embellished. Kelly is best known for the home made armour rather than any entitlement to hero worship.
What, and no Maid Marian either? No Merry men? Are you sure? So all the poor people stayed poor then?
Seriously, you’ve made an interesting point about the thousands of Irish who came here, but only Ned chose to rob and murder. I’m sure many other Irish did commit serious crimes, I do hear that James Squire was quite a handful. (Read it on the back of a bottle of beer).
But we do have a lot of Ned Kelly backers here who think he is a hero. So I reckon the debate is on! What say the NK fans about this?