(no subject)
The Destination
The destination of our travels was Melbourne.
A friend of mine was getting married to a Melbournite/Melbournonian/Melbournasian/whatever and thoughtfully invited myself and Ali. We foiled her devious plans however by scurrilously accepting the invitation and going.
We had a few days of wandering around the city, getting to see the sights and generally enjoying the ambiance (and weather). It was easily into the twenties for most of our time there and I don't think I was ever cold, which was a nice change.
Overall the city is a strange mix of things and it reminded me of New York, Dublin and Quanzhou in various places. There's a strange open sprawl about some places that very much reminded me of Chinese cities I have been to - which I was not expecting.
If you want an in depth review of the place, then you can go buy a guidebook. For my money the best places were the arcades. The names of which I have now pretty much forgotten. If you do got o Melbourne, go into all of them.
Now, as I like to be consistent, this is the part where I confess that I wrote the above a long time ago and I'm only now getting around to finishing off the post. This means that I have forgotten lots of details. Let's try and give a brief overview of things, though.
Melbourne is lovely and funky. At least the CBD (central business district) is. Outside of that I couldn't really say as I didn't spend much time there. I did visit St. Kilda which was...nice. There was a scary clown face outside a funfair and a big beach, that's about all I remember of it. Oh yes, and several great cafe/cake places. Definitely great cake places.
Possums are cute.
The roads are pretty easy to navigate, but Melbourne has something called a hook-turn which is mildly terrifying if you have never done one before. Basically you pull left before turning right across your own lanes, oncoming lanes and tram lines. It's safer...they promise. It's also terrifying if you haven't done it before.
I can't say much more of Melbourne, to be honest, like so many places it is full of hidden wonders. The Eureka Skydeck 88 is worth going up, it's a viewing platform 88 stories high from whence to see the city. To give an idea of size, the Empire State Building's viewing platform is on the 85th floor (I believe). They also have a very scary skybox which protrudes from the side of the building, called "The Edge". It has a glass floor. No I did not experience it.
I also bought a hat.
The hotel we stayed in was a delight, it was called The Crossley and was located on Little Bourke Street. The staff were friendly, helpful and polite - quite an unusual combination for hotel staff in my experience. The rooms were big, clean and comfortable and the breakfast portions were enormous. They also went out of their way to help when I had a bit of car trouble, which was nice.
It would be remiss of me at this point not to address the one tragic occurrence of the trip. I did not visit Wagamama.
Local knowledge informed me that it was not up to the standards I was used to. I suppose the only remedy is to return one day and see for myself.