Hot City

Day 1: The start to my two week holiday could not be any more perfect, warm and clear as I departed Canberra for the hour flight to Melbourne. It was a beautiful day to walk along the Yarra, taking in an ice cream and reading the papers under a tree in the Botanic Gardens. Later in the day I went to the highest building in the city, the Rialto Tower, where they had an observation deck with amazing views over the city.

Here’s the scene of many a thrashing, the MCG, which holds nearly 100,000 drunken Aussie bogans at a time.

At the top of the tower I had a nice cooling Tasmanian Cascade beer before heading down and hopping on the free city circle tram, which was slow, hot and full of people from Adelaide, so all in all not the best.

In the evening, I returned to the Yarra where the sun was dipping, the gondolas were milling across the calm water and the firecrackers were exploding in a frenzy signalling Chinese New Year, the year of the pig I believe (mmm, sweet and sour pork all round!) There were plenty of stalls and activities taking place and I sampled some of the fine food.

And that signalled the end of a long, tiring, but really pleasing day so I crossed the bridge taking in the city lights and headed back to where I was staying for a relatively early night.

Day 2: I was having the perfect Sunday morning lie in when a fire alarm at about 7am provided the most comprehensive wake up call possible. Thankfully it was a false alarm. The day picked up from that bad start and after a fine Sunday morning breakfast, it was time to head out of the city and an hour east to the Dandenongs, where I met up with my good friend Haeli and her parents in their ever beautiful home. We took a drive through the lush hills and had a yummy lunch before heading to a pub in the afternoon to watch the footie. Proper soccer footie that is – Melbourne v Adelaide in the A League Grand Final. Now if this was the other ‘footie’ the pub would’ve been packed to the rafters, millions would be gambled and fights would break out as frequently as spots on a gawky teenager. Whilst the round ball game has gained popularity there were only really a handful of people watching. Melbourne stormed to victory 6-0 I think, wasn’t really much of a contest, but it was great to go the pub on a Sunday afternoon, have some grub and watch the football, just like home. On that point, I’d just like to say come on you greens!!! We’re in the quarter finals of the FA Cup this Sunday coming (11th March) so look out!