Thanks for all the replies!
I bought myself a Celestron c65 mini Mak on ebay yesterday, it will probably be pretty much useless but it's only cost me $140 and it will give me something to play with until next year when I head off and will be good to start learning the sky, not much to see this close to melbourne anyway.
I've settled on a Benro tripod which I've found a good deal on and will probably get the Manfrotto geared head. It will be a good setup for regular photography at least.
I'm leaning toward a spotting scope at this point, it will be able to serve during the day as well as night and possible also as a telephoto lens (?) with a camera mount.
Everything is a compromise.
Still researching dslr's at this stage, from what I understand Canon are the way to go for astro. The only thing I know is my little Olympus mju tough isn't up to the job.