Ramsay Street Neighbours Tour
No Neighbours nut would consider visiting Melbourne without a trip to the holy Mecca of Australian soaps – Ramsay Street, or as it is known in real life – Pin Oak Court. You can of course travel there yourself but it wouldn’t be the same as joining the official tour.
On the morning of our tour we found ourselves legging it across the city because the tram we were waiting to catch didn’t show up (yeah TRAMS AGAIN). Anyway we made it to our meeting point (the Official Neighbours Centre) in good time, for our pick up on the Neighbours bus.
Our tour guide had us singing the show’s theme tune and kept us entertained with trivia as we travelled around on the tour. She wouldn’t tell us much in the way of soap secrets unfortunately but you might find that the cast member you meet later on will dish the dirt quite freely!
Our first stop was Erinsborough High School. We couldn’t go in but we could have our photo taken outside next to the sign with the school badge on it.
Next up – Ramsay Street! We weren’t lucky enough to see them filming but we were able to just wander around the street and take photographs of the houses – as long as we didn’t venture up the driveways and cause too much disturbance as people live in those houses! One of the biggest surprises about the street is how much smaller it is in real life than it appears on tv.
After some time on the street, we headed off down to Grease Monkeys Diner (which has a load of random dusty items in the windows and looks more like a closed up charity shop than a hip burger bar). And across the road is the garage, which again looks alot bigger on the television. It was here that we also saw the famous bus stop that the characters always exit the show at when leaving by bus (usually when they run away to Sydney). Outside the garage we had our star meeting with the actor who played Declan Napier (James Sorensen) who happily posed for photos with us and answered lots of cheeky questions we had that the guide wouldn’t answer (such as who was about to die in the current storyline).
And then it was time to head back to the Neighbours Centre, but not before we saw Detective Alec Skinner (that cop with the moustache who pops up every now and then) cycling past us!
We arrived back in the city in time for lunch! All in all the tour lasts for around 3 hours, with pick up and drop off at the Neighbours Centre on Flinders Street. You can buy souvenirs at the Neighbours Centre but they’re not that exciting, unless you want a cd of Karl Kennedy’s band (which we totally bought by the way). The tour we did was the weekday tour but there is a weekend tour also available where you can see the Lassiters complex.
And as cheesy as the soap can be (remember that episode where they saw Santa flying past in the sky?) it will always have a special place on my television screen after our fantastic time in Melbourne!
If you liked this, then you might enjoy my experience of Neighbours Night in St Kilda!
[…] the legend that is Karl Kennedy aka Alan Fletcher at Neighbours Night in St Kilda. AND I did the Neighbours Tour stopping by Ramsay Street and it was […]