Melbourne II

June 13

Upon waking up this morning I realised that this is my last Sunday morning here in Brisbane. As I begin writing this, it is 10:00am on the dot, meaning that at this time next week I will be boarding the Qantas Boeing 747 headed back to Los Angeles. Having said that, I have now realised that today marks the beginning of the “lasts” as I like to call them: today will be my last $2 steak Sunday, Wednesday will be my last Queen St. Market, Friday will be my last rugby game, etc. I cannot believe that time has come already, and while part of me is anxiously counting down the days to next week, a larger part is not wanting to leave all of a sudden, and I think it has come about as a result of the fact that everything I have known over the past four months is coming to an end. When I arrived in Brisbane all those weeks ago, I was a legit outsider (technically we still are but bear with me): I didn’t know where the grocery store was, I didn’t know the bus routes I needed to take to get where I needed to go, I didn’t know how to get to the city, etc. However, I can now navigate my way around Brisbane like I have lived here for a good portion of my life, and definitely feel as though I could survive on my own. This is all just one weird feeling right now so I’ll try not to delve into it for too long, I just needed to make that known.

Today also marks the beginning of Brett’s first (and only) week in Brisi. As you all know from my earlier posts, we spent last week travelling to two of Australia's biggest cities: Sydney and Melbourne. As you also know, I have already been to Melbourne, and I think that fact alone just goes to show how awesome of a city it is. Visiting Melbourne really almost made me wish I had chosen to study there, but once I got back here, I realised how great Brisbane actually is as well. Other than the flight down, where we had a screaming baby in front of us for 1:45 out of a 2:00 hour flight, and the kid behind me who wouldn’t stop kicking my seat, our first day in Melbourne was pretty uneventful. I went to Hertz to see about renting a car to drive along the Great Ocean Road and everything was going great until they asked to see my license. I handed it over and my biggest fear came to light: it had expired on my 21^st birthday back in May and without a valid license, they would not rent a car to me. We then went back to the hostel and booked a Great Ocean Road tour, then went out to explore the city. We first went to Federation Square, but since it was a weekday there was not much going on in the middle of the day. So we continued on down the road and reached the Shrine of Remembrance. Brett was not impressed with this building at all. When I saw it for the first time, I was awestruck and couldn’t believe how big and beautiful it was. Brett gave it a noncommittal “eh” and asked what was next. Of course, by the time we left the Shrine, it had started raining, so we were forced to wait inside the entrance for it to subside. After the rain died down, we walked over to Melbourne’s Eureka Tower, which boasts the southern hemisphere’s tallest public viewing platform. We checked out prices and put that on our list of things to do for Saturday when we would have almost a whole day in the city. Then we walked over to the Melbourne Aquarium to see how much it was, and decided that there was no way we would pay that much to look at a couple of fish. After the aquarium, we went through the Immigration Museum and learned some cool things about Australian immigration and how things all started down here. From the immigration museum, we decided to go and check out the Melbourne Museum as it is free to anyone holding a concession card. Alas, we got there right at 5:00 when the thing was closing. Unfortunately, Brett noticed that the Imax next door was playing Prince of Persia at 6:40, and asked if we could watch it since he hasn’t seen it. I complied and we went down to get our tickets. As we now had over an hour and a half before the show started, I deemed it necessary to go and get something to eat since it had been early when we ate lunch. So we started walking and came to what I’ll call “Restaurant Row” just to make things easy. We walked down one way, and I was surprised to notice every owner/manager outside on the sidewalk having a go at anyone who walked by. There was one place I would have stopped at, but the guy’s insistence turned me off to the place and we kept walking. When we got to the end, there was one place at the beginning that I hadn’t minded, but I didn’t want to walk up that way again, so we crossed the street with the intention of going back down the other side again. This never happened, as we found a place that had $12 chicken parm and I was sold. Turns out it was a great idea because it was one of the best meals I have had in Australia. A big piece of chicken and fresh, hand-cut chips that were the right combination of a crispy outside with a really soft inside. So we ate, and then went to the movie. After the movie, we headed back to the hostel and went to bed since we had to be up by 6:30 the next morning to get ready for the Great Ocean Road tour.

The tour on Thursday was pretty much the same one that I took in April, except with the worst tour guide I have ever seen in my life. She had no idea what she was talking about, and her driving was bad enough to scare even me. She was constantly weaving all over the road, ran off the road at one point, got lost a half dozen times, killed the battery on the bus when we stopped for lunch, and missed her turn-off on the road back. I was so thankful to be done with her when she dropped us off. I apologised to Brett because the tour I took was awesome, with a knowledgeable guide and everything. Unfortunately, the same tour guide showed up the next morning for our Phillip Island tour. I was so mad, it put an immediate damper on my mood for the day. The driving was as bad as the day before, she even went right of centre a few times into oncoming traffic, and the descriptions of where we were going and what we were doing were slightly better, although that may be because I didn’t have anything to compare it to like I did the Great Ocean Road. The first stop was a wine and cheese tasting, of which the cheese got more attention from Brett and I than the wine did. It was good cheese, and, of course, made me miss Holmes County cheese as well. To make us feel even more at home, we were surrounded by cows and green rolling hills. Sure felt a lot like HC. The next stop was the Phillip Island Chocolate Factory, by far the highlight of the day other than the penguins we saw. This place was incredible. They had so many things made out of chocolate: a life-size David statue made out of milk-chocolate, a replica of The Scream, and a few other artsy-type things. They also had a chocolate village, complete with buildings, cars, roads, and trains. In the next room, we found the world’s largest chocolate waterfall (400kg every three minutes) and a robot that got you a piece of whatever chocolate you wanted when you pressed the corresponding button. The next room had windows so you could actually see the people working doing what chocolateers do. There was also a machine where you could make your own design and then eat it, and one where you could make your own chocolate bar with your choice of four flavours: cola, strawberry, wasabi, or vegemite (I stuck with strawberry). After the factory, we went to the koala conservatory where we saw a crap-load of koalas sitting in the trees. We were even luck enough so see one move around which is almost unheard of since they sleep for 20+ hours a day. After the kolas, we went to this place called the “Nobbies,” which is pretty much just another apostle just in a different location (and much bigger). That was cool and we got some good views and some good action shots of the waves crashing into the rocks. The highlight of this stop was that we saw penguins under the walkways, and what a sight they were. They are called “The Little Penguins” because they are so small (obviously) and there was a group of them just chilling under the boardwalk. Of course, this wasn’t as cool as the Penguin Parade we saw after that, where up to 2,000 penguins come in from the ocean and go back to their burrows for the night. That was so cool. Just all these little penguins forming little groups and then scurrying across the sand to the grasses where they would then make their way back to their houses. A very cool sight indeed.

The next day, our last in Melbourne, we spent back in the city, walking around and taking in the sights. Brett had seen a Mexican place the night before so we walked down there but they were closed unfortunately. So we walked all the way back up to get lunch, then dropped our bags off at the hostel so we didn’t have to carry them around, and went back towards Federation Square. We decided to go up the Eureka Tower, and I’m glad we did because the views were unbelievable. You could see forever in any direction, with a bird’s eye view of Melbourne. The best part was going up 88 storeys in 38 seconds, faster than it takes my lift to go up five storeys. We then went back to Fed Square where we watched a comedian before heading back to the hostel to get picked up for the airport. When we finally got to the terminal, the first thing I notice is a large group of people waiting in line for check-in. I checked the notice board and see that the flight to Brisbane has been delayed three hours. When we finally got to the counter, the lady said that the plane was deemed “inoperable” so they were sending a new one to take us back. Not to mention three other flights were checking in at the same time, so this little warehouse had a throng of people in it making it crowded and noisy with everyone pushing anyone to try and find a place to sit. Eventually the plane came, but by now no trains were running in Brisbane so we had to take the bus to the CBD, then we ran to catch the last City Cat leaving from Queen Street. Luckily we made it so we didn’t have to walk home, and got home around 1:00 this morning. We said hi to the guys that were still up, then quickly showered and went to bed. I almost fell asleep on the ferry out of utter exhaustion. Needless to say, I am never, ever going to fly on Tiger Airways again, and I would advise all to do the same. Their fares may be dirt cheap, but you have no idea when or if your plane will show up and after last night, I must say it just isn’t worth it.

But I almost forgot to mention one of the best parts about Melbourne: the Queen Victoria Market, two to three city blocks of deals and bargains you can’t find anywhere else. I did much of my souvi shopping here, and would have probably gotten more but Tiger only gives you a 7kg carry-on with a $15 charge for every kilo you’re over so I didn’t want to buy too much. I just wanted to say this place was amazing, and would encourage everyone who visits Melbourne to check it out at least for a little bit. And make sure you walk through the whole thing because many dealers have the same things but some have 2fers and are cheaper than others. All in all, it was a great week, but I’m glad to be back here where I can relax for a while and just show Brett where I’ve been living for the past four months. Now that I’m finished with this post, I checked my time again and a week from today, we will be ½ hour into our 13 hour flight back to L.A.