Rainy Weekends Rewarded with Adventures in Melbourne!

Hi!

Well. Here we are, a nice, warm, breezy, super sunny Sunday afternoon. Got some way groovy jazz tunes courtesy of the SkyFM BeBop channel, got a cool glass of Rosemount Estate Semillion Sauv-Blanc (eh, not bad but I prefer my standby), the laundry is hanging catching a breeze and some rays, the birds are out there going about their Sunday errands (hopefully not pooping all over mah clean clothes), life is good!

So work. Yep. Is pretty good. 'Course, last week I was only there for a day - Monday we had a day off for the Queen's Birthday, went to work Tuesday and had Wed-Fri off because I took some vacation time to go to Melbourne (more on that later), so last week was pretty good! Otherwise, work is quite good. The work is, well, work, but I like the folks I work with, the work isn't difficult, there aren't any whip-cracking managers to hop to it, it's a pretty good gig. Always happy to have a good gig!

And then there were a few weekends in there. Apologies for missing last week and the week before - that first weekend of June is when Mom arrived so was busy running around with her, getting prepaid cell phone cards, bus passes, etc. The weather has been pretty crap until this past week (well, I assume, seeing as we just returned last night, and it's been nice today), so for the last few weekends we just tried to keep entertained and warm and dry. We really just ran around town, dodging the odd rain showers, errands/sight-seeing, and just having a good look around. That's a pretty tough plane ride so it takes a few days to recover. Add to that the fact that she left 100+ degree, long summer days to arrive in 40+ cold and damp short days, and yeah, it'd take you a minute or two to adjust. But, the fridge is full, all is well!

Last weekend we met my friend Kim and headed up to Redcliffe to have a little walk/look around (in between the bursts of rain) and some lunch. It was just nice to get out and go for a walk near the sea (well, Moreton Bay) and thankfully the weather behaved for most of the day.

And then this weekend an Adventure was had! Wednesday morning we flew into a damp and cool Melbourne and surprised Jeff and Emily (long-time family friends, heck, they're like family. You might remember them from previous episodes where I went down to Melbourne to catch up with them a couple times) by bringing Mom along - they hadn't caught up in like 5 or so years, so that was a fun surprise. And around Melbourne we went! Jeff is teaching a PhD program at Monash University there so he was in the middle of unpacking the stuff he'd shipped over from the States, buying washers, dryers, air beds, etc - settling-in stuff that has to be done. His bummer is he had to do it in a weeks time before he had to head back to the States with Emily on (this) Sunday - whew! It's hard work being an in-demand professor on two continents! But thankfully they managed to find enough time to get stuff done and get out and about and run around with us.

Wednesday was lunch and errands, not too Adventure-worthy but it had to be done. Thursday we were up and out to Phillip Island where we took in as much as we could in the seemingly short amount of time we had - it's a hefty drive south of Melbourne, about an hour and some, longer than I thought, add to that getting lost a couple times looking for the right roads, stopping for a quick errand...... And the weather was a bit rainy off and on, cool, cloudy, typical Melbourne in the winter really. Once on the island we stopped in at the Rusty Water Brewery where we sat by a roaring fire and had a really decent lunch (I can highly recommend the Koala Pale Ale) before heading over to the Koala Conservation Centre to learn all there is to know about koalas (they're NOT bears! They're marsupials!), saw a few sleeping in trees, it was neat. Knowing that koalas are heading towards being a threatened species, anything to protect them has to be a good thing. Shame, but until developers stop building massive sub-divisions in places koalas have to live, then living in a sanctuary is the way it has to be. Go little koalas! Then, suitably educated, we headed over to Churchill Island which is a little island with a really neat, good-sized farmstead (with amazing views out to sea) from the early 1800s. The locals sure seem to take a lot of pride in it and keep it very well maintained. The farm, in addition to the usual cows, horses and chickens, even had Highland cows! Then, running out of time, we headed over to watch the Penguin Parade where, at least on the night we were there, over 1,200 Little Penguins came home from a hard days/weeks fishing out at sea. We weren't allowed to take any pictures, so on that link I've included, scroll down a little and there's a little video about what you see on the night. It was awesome. I mean, it was neat to see them pop out of the sea, collect together and waddle up the beach in little groups but the part I liked best was when they finally made it home, they'd all kind of stand around near their burrows and wait and call out to their friends and family until they were all together again (uh, or not, as nature may dictate). It was reallyreally good. If you ever head down that way, I can highly recommend it! All in all, it was a good, highly educational day - Hooray for Adventure!

Friday Emily and I headed into town to have some lunch at a really good little Mexican restaurant called Senoritas. Because it's been soooooo long since I've had any Mexican food, let alone good stuff, I was in 7th heaven. Plus, our waiter was a young Mexican guy from San Francisco. Although, I must say, while the tequila they used on the margarita was super good, the margarita itself was lacking. Small, watery, meh. The good tequila made up for it tho. Then we headed out to shop, something we're not fans of but it had to be done. Unbelievably, it took us all afternoon until we had to meet up with Mom and Jeff so we could head out to dinner at the Colonial Tramcar Restaurant, a beautifully restored set of early 1900s tramcars where you have dinner (in our case we had the "early" 3-course dinner, there's also a 5-course dinner later at night) while it travels through the city down to St. Kilda (past Luna Park) and back. It was lovely and super cool. Boy folks those days were sure tiny! So again, when you head this way, I can highly recommend a trip on that for dinner.

Saturday saw Emily and I packed and ready to go (Mom and I to leave that afternoon, them to leave early the next day) and the two of us again headed into town to finish shopping (I know, gasp). Once finished in town (Bourke Street to be exact) we headed out to scope out the Rose Street Markets in the cool hip n' groovy 'hood of Fitzroy, where we later met up with Mom and Jeff to have some lunch at Rustica Sourdough Bakery & Cafe (a comfortable little place that just opened in May, with pretty good pizza and what looked like an amazing selection of fresh sourdough breads - go the little independents!!!). Happily fed, watered and wined, we crept into crazy crowded Saturday afternoon traffic to get us to the airport in time for our flight back to Brisbane. WHEW! And today, well, laundry, chores and checking in - ahhhhh Sundays.

I really like Melbourne. Each time I go I see/discover more that I like and each time I go I seriously consider moving down there. While everyone moans about their winters, it can't be nearly as terrible as winter in NYC, so that doesn't really put me off. Hey, all it would take is a good job............? So if you ever head down this way and you have the time, I can highly recommend a trip to Melbourne!

Otherwise, I hope you're all well up there. Drop a line if you, well, are alive and even reading this, and if you ever have any questions. Hurry up and get down here already!!!!!

BYE!

J!