Francesca and Henk-Jan's Backpacking Trip!
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Sydney!
Our last day in Melbourne was rather uneventful, leaving us packing our backpacks for departure to Sydney early the next day. We also finally updated our blog, which had been long overdue. We have to keep our readers happy and our stories fresh!
The next morning we woke up around 07:30AM, leaving us just enough time to check out and grab some free slices of raisin bread before walking off to the bus stop just around the corner. A comfortable shuttle and a 20 minute drive took us right to the domestic terminal and not long after we were getting ready for departure. Francesca bought us a Krispy Kreme’s Original Glaze Doughnut, which I had never had before. Certainly a good little snack to keep us going!
The flight itself went by fast, as we watched the latest episode of Gossip Girl (well, part of it). After little more than an hour the plane touched the ground again; we had arrived in Sydney. Before departure we had already booked ourselves into MAZE backpackers, a (hopefully) nicer hostel right in the city center, with decently priced rooms. They also offered a free airport pick-up, which we obviously made use of!
A quick drive took us right there, and as we took our bags across the street we already saw the spotless sky above us. Sunshine all around! Francesca and I got settled in and walked outside. We found a backpackers’ travel agency around the corner, where we could make use of some free internet. Francesca’s dad had sent us an e-mail saying there had been a sandstorm right in Sydney. We looked around and saw absolutely nothing! Strange! After asking some people however, we found out that the storm had already subsided, and that there was just some residue on unwashed cars left as proof.
It being a sunny day, we decided to go check out the city. We got a map with our welcoming package from the hostel, which highlighted the monorail’s route through the city center, so Francesca and I decided to follow it. After a bit of a walk to get to city’s observation tower we turned left onto Pyrmont Bridge, which crosses over Darling Harbour. The view here is already quite stunning, overlooking the sea on side, and the city on the other. We got to have a look at the outside of the Aquarium and the WildlifeWorld, but decided not to go in because we had either already seen the animals, or we’re still about to.
Walking in the sun had made Francesca quite thirsty, so I got her a Diet Coke. A drink always makes the lady happy. The food courts under the main streets here are enormous, so we walked through parts of them, window-shopping away. By the time we got out it had gotten quite frisky outside, so we decided to head back to the hostel. We found a cool little spiral fountain on the way back, which Francesca ran down for some good pictures. As dusk fell we moved to the boardwalk, where she sat down for some more stunning shots.
Back in the city center I pointed to a lightshow by Lumière, which showed a fountain with purple lighting, much to Francesca’s approval and delight. After dinner we headed back to the hostel and turned in for the night.
The following day saw us exploring more of the city; this time we headed for the most well-known buildings in the city: the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. On the way there we had a quick look at the Town Hall, which unfortunately was closed due to renovations. Francesca and I also checked out Queen Victoria’s statue in front of Queen Victoria’s Building. In front of the building somebody was praising the Lord through a megaphone, discouraging us from staying there much longer. Ten minutes later I pointed to a funny-looking shape just up the street: part of the Opera House. Francesca had been very excited about seeing the Opera House, so we sat down near the sea and overlooked the harbor. With a clear-blue sky overhead it was easy to take some nice photos of both highlights of Sydney.
Our most pleasant surprise however came from a Sony employee that asked us if she could take a panorama picture of us. For free! Of course we said yes, and posed for it. It should be available to us tomorrow, so we’ll download it and add it to the blog as soon as possible.
Obviously one can’t just look at the outside of the Opera House, so we inquired within to see if there was a tour that we could do, and what that would involve. What we heard appealed to us, so we got our tickets for the 14:00PM guided tour. We also looked at tickets for an opera, but we couldn’t find a seat/price combination that satisfied us, so we left the decision for later. Our guide picked us up right under the Opera House and gave us some headsets to be able to hear her everywhere. She took us around the outside for some good pictures, and then took us up one of the staircases for a view of the glass hull. She pointed out that we could see the reflection of the Bridge in the glass. Neat!
Next, she took us inside and showed us the foyer. Francesca’s eyes lit up; the whole foyer was dressed in her favorite shade of purple! A few pictures later the guide asked us to sit down and watch a video of the history of the Opera House. In the 50’s Sydney held a competition for the grand design of a new Opera House in the city. The location (a thin strip of land stretching out in the harbor) was already known, the other liberties were left to the architects. Most submissions were straightforward, square buildings; a few ventured into the unknown with round entries; and one stood out, with a completely innovative idea. It had been submitted by Jorn Utzon, a Danish architect that had never actually been to Sydney, and had based his idea on pictures and sketches of the area only.
Unfortunately, the submission missed a few crucial entry points and was therefore rejected. When the judges came together for the final decision they couldn’t quite reach a unanimous verdict. One of them asked for all the previously rejected plans, and picked out Utzon’s sketches. Even though his plans were very basic, broke several rules and had no real financial plan it was still chosen as the winner. The initial idea was that the construction would take 3 years and cost about 7 million Australian dollars.
It ended up taking 16 years and costing well over 100 million Australian dollars. Utzon resigned halfway during the construction, as he didn’t get paid anymore. He left Australia, never to return. Sydney successfully financed the Opera House by holding a lottery. They employed an Australian architect to finish the project and finally Sydney had its completed Opera House.
Ann, our guide, first showed us the concert hall, which looked quite impressive with its natural acoustics and ‘sound doughnuts’ to prevent distortion. Next Ann took us to the small space between the two halls, with an overview of the city on one side and the sea on the other. Quite calming! We then proceeded to the opera hall, a smaller version of the concert hall. We were not completely impressed and started wondering why the building had ended up being called the Opera House, when in fact that part was smaller. Ann answered that one of the most influential citizens back then had been a big opera aficionado and had demanded it be called the Opera House; Ann said Performing Arts Center would have been far more apt.
Our last stop was the Utzon Room, a room designated for children’s plays. Sydney had realized they hadn’t been very kind to their architect, and tried to make it up to him. However, Utzon was in his eighties and too old to travel. He sent his son, and his son helped with renovations, and ultimately a room was named after Utzon. Utzon accepted the honor from his home in Denmark and his son is still involved in the ongoing overhaul.
Francesca and I thanked Ann for the tour and headed outside again to soak up some more sun. We decided to check out the rest of the area, and see if we could maybe get on the Bridge. We wandered into the Tourist Information Center and found some more brochures of things to do. As we looked for a way to get up on the bridge Francesca spotted a cool-looking gallery. Much more interesting than the photo exhibition were the foosball-tables in the middle of the room. I challenged her to a duel and before we knew it we had been playing for more than half an hour. I hadn’t really considered what the place might be, but Francesca thought it looked more like a shared student house, or something similar. Finally, one of the guys standing around came up to us and offered us a beer. We didn’t think much of it, but gladly accepted the offer. The guy walked off again, without saying much and we continued playing.
Ultimately one of them thought it’d be wise to inform us: we had walked into Saatchi & Saatchi, an advertisement agency and the employees were having a party. The gallery was indeed a gallery, but not as we thought: it had been set up for local artists, and they could show their creations here for free. The guy, Andrew, told us we had been the first people to come in and actually stay, playing foosball. They had thought it was funny, and decided to see what we were going to do. We ended up staying there for several hours, talking to Andrew and two Italians that had been invited to the party. We were challenged to some foosball doubles; we got beat, but we stood our ground. I managed to teach Francesca a few tricks, and we had a lot of fun doing so.
Andrew finally said he was going home and we felt it was time for dinner. He asked us what we wanted to eat and Francesca answered we had been wanting to try kangaroo and/or emu-meat. Luckily enough for us he told us of a cool hotel/restaurant called Hotel Australia that served kangaroo and emu-pizzas. The best of two worlds for us! Andrew said he had to go past the hotel on the way and gave us a hint that we could climb the bridge along the way as well. Being very hungry we headed for the hotel first. We sat down and ordered a half and half pizza. One half being Pepper Kangaroo (marinated in native pepper with roasted capsicum and native berries) and the other being BBQ Emu (Spanish onion, fresh basil leaves and cherry tomatoes). So good! Both had a very distinct and very unique flavor, and were pretty much fat free! We enjoyed a bit of Rugby Nation whilst loving our pizza.
Our walk back to the hostel included the bridge, as we had planned. We had a great overview of both the Harbour Bridge, bathing in light and seagulls, and the Opera House, lit up in pinkish fuchsia. It felt like we had the whole bridge to ourselves as we strolled back to the quay. A Japanese couple asked us to take a picture of them and returned the favor for us. With a really cool day behind us Francesca and I walked back to the hostel. Sleep was sweet.
The next morning we woke up around 07:30AM, leaving us just enough time to check out and grab some free slices of raisin bread before walking off to the bus stop just around the corner. A comfortable shuttle and a 20 minute drive took us right to the domestic terminal and not long after we were getting ready for departure. Francesca bought us a Krispy Kreme’s Original Glaze Doughnut, which I had never had before. Certainly a good little snack to keep us going!
The flight itself went by fast, as we watched the latest episode of Gossip Girl (well, part of it). After little more than an hour the plane touched the ground again; we had arrived in Sydney. Before departure we had already booked ourselves into MAZE backpackers, a (hopefully) nicer hostel right in the city center, with decently priced rooms. They also offered a free airport pick-up, which we obviously made use of!
A quick drive took us right there, and as we took our bags across the street we already saw the spotless sky above us. Sunshine all around! Francesca and I got settled in and walked outside. We found a backpackers’ travel agency around the corner, where we could make use of some free internet. Francesca’s dad had sent us an e-mail saying there had been a sandstorm right in Sydney. We looked around and saw absolutely nothing! Strange! After asking some people however, we found out that the storm had already subsided, and that there was just some residue on unwashed cars left as proof.
It being a sunny day, we decided to go check out the city. We got a map with our welcoming package from the hostel, which highlighted the monorail’s route through the city center, so Francesca and I decided to follow it. After a bit of a walk to get to city’s observation tower we turned left onto Pyrmont Bridge, which crosses over Darling Harbour. The view here is already quite stunning, overlooking the sea on side, and the city on the other. We got to have a look at the outside of the Aquarium and the WildlifeWorld, but decided not to go in because we had either already seen the animals, or we’re still about to.
Walking in the sun had made Francesca quite thirsty, so I got her a Diet Coke. A drink always makes the lady happy. The food courts under the main streets here are enormous, so we walked through parts of them, window-shopping away. By the time we got out it had gotten quite frisky outside, so we decided to head back to the hostel. We found a cool little spiral fountain on the way back, which Francesca ran down for some good pictures. As dusk fell we moved to the boardwalk, where she sat down for some more stunning shots.
Back in the city center I pointed to a lightshow by Lumière, which showed a fountain with purple lighting, much to Francesca’s approval and delight. After dinner we headed back to the hostel and turned in for the night.
The following day saw us exploring more of the city; this time we headed for the most well-known buildings in the city: the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. On the way there we had a quick look at the Town Hall, which unfortunately was closed due to renovations. Francesca and I also checked out Queen Victoria’s statue in front of Queen Victoria’s Building. In front of the building somebody was praising the Lord through a megaphone, discouraging us from staying there much longer. Ten minutes later I pointed to a funny-looking shape just up the street: part of the Opera House. Francesca had been very excited about seeing the Opera House, so we sat down near the sea and overlooked the harbor. With a clear-blue sky overhead it was easy to take some nice photos of both highlights of Sydney.
Our most pleasant surprise however came from a Sony employee that asked us if she could take a panorama picture of us. For free! Of course we said yes, and posed for it. It should be available to us tomorrow, so we’ll download it and add it to the blog as soon as possible.
Obviously one can’t just look at the outside of the Opera House, so we inquired within to see if there was a tour that we could do, and what that would involve. What we heard appealed to us, so we got our tickets for the 14:00PM guided tour. We also looked at tickets for an opera, but we couldn’t find a seat/price combination that satisfied us, so we left the decision for later. Our guide picked us up right under the Opera House and gave us some headsets to be able to hear her everywhere. She took us around the outside for some good pictures, and then took us up one of the staircases for a view of the glass hull. She pointed out that we could see the reflection of the Bridge in the glass. Neat!
Next, she took us inside and showed us the foyer. Francesca’s eyes lit up; the whole foyer was dressed in her favorite shade of purple! A few pictures later the guide asked us to sit down and watch a video of the history of the Opera House. In the 50’s Sydney held a competition for the grand design of a new Opera House in the city. The location (a thin strip of land stretching out in the harbor) was already known, the other liberties were left to the architects. Most submissions were straightforward, square buildings; a few ventured into the unknown with round entries; and one stood out, with a completely innovative idea. It had been submitted by Jorn Utzon, a Danish architect that had never actually been to Sydney, and had based his idea on pictures and sketches of the area only.
Unfortunately, the submission missed a few crucial entry points and was therefore rejected. When the judges came together for the final decision they couldn’t quite reach a unanimous verdict. One of them asked for all the previously rejected plans, and picked out Utzon’s sketches. Even though his plans were very basic, broke several rules and had no real financial plan it was still chosen as the winner. The initial idea was that the construction would take 3 years and cost about 7 million Australian dollars.
It ended up taking 16 years and costing well over 100 million Australian dollars. Utzon resigned halfway during the construction, as he didn’t get paid anymore. He left Australia, never to return. Sydney successfully financed the Opera House by holding a lottery. They employed an Australian architect to finish the project and finally Sydney had its completed Opera House.
Ann, our guide, first showed us the concert hall, which looked quite impressive with its natural acoustics and ‘sound doughnuts’ to prevent distortion. Next Ann took us to the small space between the two halls, with an overview of the city on one side and the sea on the other. Quite calming! We then proceeded to the opera hall, a smaller version of the concert hall. We were not completely impressed and started wondering why the building had ended up being called the Opera House, when in fact that part was smaller. Ann answered that one of the most influential citizens back then had been a big opera aficionado and had demanded it be called the Opera House; Ann said Performing Arts Center would have been far more apt.
Our last stop was the Utzon Room, a room designated for children’s plays. Sydney had realized they hadn’t been very kind to their architect, and tried to make it up to him. However, Utzon was in his eighties and too old to travel. He sent his son, and his son helped with renovations, and ultimately a room was named after Utzon. Utzon accepted the honor from his home in Denmark and his son is still involved in the ongoing overhaul.
Francesca and I thanked Ann for the tour and headed outside again to soak up some more sun. We decided to check out the rest of the area, and see if we could maybe get on the Bridge. We wandered into the Tourist Information Center and found some more brochures of things to do. As we looked for a way to get up on the bridge Francesca spotted a cool-looking gallery. Much more interesting than the photo exhibition were the foosball-tables in the middle of the room. I challenged her to a duel and before we knew it we had been playing for more than half an hour. I hadn’t really considered what the place might be, but Francesca thought it looked more like a shared student house, or something similar. Finally, one of the guys standing around came up to us and offered us a beer. We didn’t think much of it, but gladly accepted the offer. The guy walked off again, without saying much and we continued playing.
Ultimately one of them thought it’d be wise to inform us: we had walked into Saatchi & Saatchi, an advertisement agency and the employees were having a party. The gallery was indeed a gallery, but not as we thought: it had been set up for local artists, and they could show their creations here for free. The guy, Andrew, told us we had been the first people to come in and actually stay, playing foosball. They had thought it was funny, and decided to see what we were going to do. We ended up staying there for several hours, talking to Andrew and two Italians that had been invited to the party. We were challenged to some foosball doubles; we got beat, but we stood our ground. I managed to teach Francesca a few tricks, and we had a lot of fun doing so.
Andrew finally said he was going home and we felt it was time for dinner. He asked us what we wanted to eat and Francesca answered we had been wanting to try kangaroo and/or emu-meat. Luckily enough for us he told us of a cool hotel/restaurant called Hotel Australia that served kangaroo and emu-pizzas. The best of two worlds for us! Andrew said he had to go past the hotel on the way and gave us a hint that we could climb the bridge along the way as well. Being very hungry we headed for the hotel first. We sat down and ordered a half and half pizza. One half being Pepper Kangaroo (marinated in native pepper with roasted capsicum and native berries) and the other being BBQ Emu (Spanish onion, fresh basil leaves and cherry tomatoes). So good! Both had a very distinct and very unique flavor, and were pretty much fat free! We enjoyed a bit of Rugby Nation whilst loving our pizza.
Our walk back to the hostel included the bridge, as we had planned. We had a great overview of both the Harbour Bridge, bathing in light and seagulls, and the Opera House, lit up in pinkish fuchsia. It felt like we had the whole bridge to ourselves as we strolled back to the quay. A Japanese couple asked us to take a picture of them and returned the favor for us. With a really cool day behind us Francesca and I walked back to the hostel. Sleep was sweet.
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Melbourne, Part Two: Kengurus! (And more...)
Hi everyone!
For Sunday, we had an all-day trip planned to Phillip Island, this tiny island about 140 kilometers away from Melbourne. Henk heard about the island his first time in Oz, and knew it had a ton of wildlife to see, but had never gone himself. We booked onto a tour that would drive us first to a wildlife reserve, serve us a gourmet sandwich lunch, bring us to a farm, and then finally end the day on Phillip Island -- watching the 'penguin parade' and having a pizza dinner. Sounded awesome! And it was. Here's how the day went:
First, we had a 40 minute drive out to the 32,000 acre wildlife reserve. It wasn't too scenic a drive -- well, to be honest, I wouldn't know because I was sleeping/resting on Henk's lap the entire time! Anyways, I woke up just in time to jump out of the van, and have a snake put around my neck! What a wake-up call. :P
We had arrived at Moonlit Sanctuary. One of the first animals we saw was a lace monitor, which looks like a large lizard. The female lays her eggs in termite mounds, and then the termites close up the mounds keeping the egg safe inside and incubated at a constant temperature. The young hatch after 8 to 9 months and the female lace monitor returns to dig them back up. Next we saw some wild birds, including one slightly blue feathered bird that is carnivorous called a Kookaburra and a very cool ‘Egyptian-eye’ bird. We saw a koala again, this one however was asleep. And!! We saw a dingo for the first time – and decided that our first dog will be a cross-breed of a dingo and a husky.
One of the highlights of our animal adventure was feeding emus! Henk fed the emu, and then forced me to feed the emu – which was kinda scary! Look at my reaction when the emu snapped at the food in my hand. Freaky! It looked like a mini dinosaur was about to attack. Next we crossed through a bunch of yellow-beaked geese to get to another famous Australian animal: the wombat!
Wombats looked like giant fluffy guinea pigs, but they are actually marsupials because they have a pouch for their Joey (in Australia, baby animals which don’t have an official name are called Joeys). We learned something awesome about their tailbones. They have a thick bone about half an inch under their fur that they use for protection from predators.
For example, if a dingo was chasing a wombat, the wombat would run into a burrow in the ground with its behind in the air. First it would have the dingo pry at its behind, then, once the dingo realizes there is a thick bone in the way, the wombat would create a little space for the dingo to get its head into the burrow. Once the dingo shoves itself in the burrow, the wombat would push its behind up, crushing the neck of the dingo or at the very least suffocating it. The thick wombat bone also protects the wombat’s Joey in case of a car accident – so always check for a young Joey inside a wombat’s pouch if you hit one on the road!
My personal favorite animal was next! Wallabies! These cute little animals looked kinda like chinchillas with larger legs and ears. They are less than 2 feet tall standing on their hind legs, and many of them had little Joeys still in their pouches! Awesome!! Henk and I got to feed a bunch of them, and I even got to feed one of the Joeys because the mother realized I wasn’t a threat. Their larger relatives, the kangaroos, were a little further into the park. These were a bit bigger than I had imagined them, standing at around 5 feet tall. We fed the kangaroos the rest of our animal feed, and then walked back towards the park entrance to get some lunch ourselves. Just sandwiches, but we were pretty hungry so we ate them up. On our walk back we tried to lure the Tasmanian devil out of its cage, but it wasn’t interested in showing its face. Sad!
Our next stop was on Churchill Island at a working farm from the late 1800’s. We pet some of the animals, and watched a trained dog run around some ducks. I also chased after some sheep, unsuccessfully trying to catch one of them. After the farm, we made a quick stop at a chocolate factory (our driver’s awesome suggestion!) to grab some free samples and buy a chocolate lizard to snack on. Then we finally got to Phillip Island at around 4:30 pm. We had some free time to walk around reading information about seals and penguins, because our ‘Penguin Parade’ show didn’t start until around 6:30 pm. We learned that ‘Korri ‘Yong’ is the Aboriginal tribe Bunurong’s name for Phillip Island, a name which means ‘Sandy Place.’ As we were leaving the information center, we were shocked by the number of seagulls all over the place!
The ‘Penguin Parade’ is a daily event during which the tiniest species of penguins (called the ‘Little Penguins’) standing at just over a foot tall each, come ashore after a multi-day fishing trip. They waddle in groups across the beach over the course of an hour, moving quickly towards their burrows which can sometimes be up to over a mile away. Henk and I found a good spot to sit, waiting for the penguins to come. They arrived a bit later than expected, around 6:45 pm (the penguins come in depending on the time the sun sets) and started to move clumsily towards us. We saw a group of about ten penguins stumbling slowly but carefully over a bunch of rocks, rather than taking the smooth path on either side of the rocks. Silly little buggers!
After seeing a few dozen of them crossing, we headed back to the walkway which ran alongside the area the penguins were waddling. Here we got to see a bunch of them up close! We couldn’t take any pictures however, since flash photography could disorient the penguins. Penguins are quite funny when they are disoriented however. We learned from our guide earlier in the day, that these little penguins ‘fight’ with each other for the best burrow spots – and they ‘beat’ each other up: one penguin will grab another penguin under its little flipper arm and run in circles to ‘spin’ the other penguin. Then, the attacker penguin would let go, leaving the other penguin confused and disoriented, walking in circles dizzily. Such a cute way of fighting!
As we were leaving the parade, we saw a sign to check under the car for little stray penguins. Some of the penguins have a habit of crossing over the car-park on the way back to their burrows… and we don’t want to squash them under the tires! Once we had seen the penguins, we stopped off for our pizza dinner. Yum! We chatted with a few fellow passengers while we filled our stomachs with free pizza, and then got back on the bus for the 2 hour drive back to Melbourne. A long day, but well worth it!
On Monday, Henk and I planned to take a tour of Town Hall, hopefully learning a bit more about the founding of Australia – which in perspective was pretty recent. But first we walked through some of the interesting shopping streets and stopped off in Federation Square to admire some of the cool architecture. We saw that there was an event going on: the AFL’s (Australian Football League) finals are coming weekend, so several companies were giving away freebies; others had us guessing how many footballs were stashed in a car to win that car/ tickets to the AFL finals. We even got some free Vegemite (bitter tasting jelly), which tasted horrible. Henk took pictures of the view over the Square, which is located right next to St. Paul’s Cathedral.
As we made our way towards Town Hall, we saw another major train station, Flinders Street Station, on the corner. We jumped on the 1:00 pm tour, which ended up being just three people besides our guide! First we were led through the halls and were shown paintings/drawings of Melbourne both early and late in its ‘growth.’ Basically, Melbourne went from all grasslands to high-tech city in just 40 years! Pretty much exploded out of nowhere. The streets were designed to be 30 meters wide, quite large for a city of that day. It paved the way for the tram system, put in by Americans, that is still in place today (and used by tourists and locals alike!)
We learned the meaning behind Melbourne’s city crest – which included a kangaroo looking over its shoulder. Our guide explained this was because a kangaroo can only move (hop) forwards, and as the city would move forward, they would still need to look to the past for guidance. The highlight of our tour was a sneak-peek behind the huge organ in the large auditorium/ball-room. It was massive; 8000 different sized pipes in total, and controlled by 5 keyboards. Finally, our tour concluded with a walk out onto the famous balcony where years ago the Beatles waved to their massive crowd of 40 thousand fans.
Right after our tour ended, we made our way to the Koorie Cultural Heritage Centre, where we spent the next couple of hours. There wasn’t too much to see, which was kinda disappointing, but we sat around for a while watching little video clips of modern Aboriginals explaining the ways of their people. Aboriginals are extremely dark-skinned people with prominent features such as a heavy brow-bone and wide noses. They were a mostly nomadic people that had hand-made weapons such as greenstone axes (much like New Zealand Maori!) and boomerangs, and they created unique music with didgeridoos.
Unfortunately, the arrival of European colonialists – much like with the Native Americans – decimated their population. Aboriginals were first massacred by settlers (killing off 10% of their people) and then plagued with smallpox (which killed off more than 80% of their people.) This resulted in the near loss of an entire culture, which probably explains the lack of information at the cultural center. Sad story…
That evening, we returned to the Pancake Parlour for more pancakes and more free internet! On our way out we found a fun-house mirror, which resulted in this awesome picture.
The next morning we started by jumping on the free city tram which passed by some of Melbourne’s interesting artwork, such as ‘cow in a tree!’ We were on our way to Queen Victoria’s Market – which has over 2000 stands of fresh foods, including meats, fish, fruits, vegetables, breads and cheeses! There were also tons of souvenir items and random junk for sale. Henk and I decided to have a fruit and cheese ‘platter’ for dinner, after sampling some deliciously creamy cheese at one of the stands: Tilba Club Cheese! Yum! We bought some mini mandarin oranges, grapes, sweet strawberries, and a quarter wheel of Tilba cheese. Then we made our way to the bread stand to pick up a loaf of sourdough ciabatta. Before we left the market, we tried an Australian banana (dried and covered with honey – we think – and tasted a lot like raisin!).
Henk and I headed back to the hostel to see if our new card had arrived – it hadn’t. We would have to wait until 9 pm that night to see if we could rebook our flight for a day later. We left the hostel again, making a quick stop at the Exhibition Centre. Since nothing was on, we grabbed the tram out to St. Kilda, a suburb of Melbourne. This area is rather famous for its artsy nature, and Henk had said it was a nice area, so I really wanted to see it.
But before we explored the area, we stopped off in a pharmacy to see if we could get something for Henk to put on the huge red bumps (which we assumed were bites because they itched a ton) which he had since our first night in Melbourne. The woman working there took one look at Henk’s bumps and went to grab some tablets for him to take. ‘Yeah, those are bedbug bites,’ she told us, ‘which are really common in the hostels in the cities.’ Ewww! We realized we had been sleeping with bedbugs for the past 7 nights! SO NASTY! The tablet stopped Henk’s itching right away, so our fears were confirmed.
The two of us walked down St. Kilda’s pier, which provided a great view of the city. Next we made our way down the Esplanade to Luna Park, an amusement park where it is free to walk around, but you have to pay cash per ride. We didn’t want to waste any money on rides, but luckily Henk found us a racecar game that had 4 credits left in it! We each got to play twice, while taking pictures of some of the old-school games in-between.
After Luna Park, we walked down Acland Street and got some award-winning ice-cream at ‘Trampoline,’ while looking through the windows at fancy little cakes and tarts. The street was pretty cool – there were colorful mosaic decorations and fascinating shops. Lots of fun walking around that area! But we were still hoping our card would show up, and we were pretty hungry and eager for our fruit and cheese platter dinner so we left soon after.
Since our card had still not arrived, we called AA One World and re-booked to fly a day later than planned. How convenient! Even a night before our flight, with our Around-The-World special ticket, we can still reschedule at no extra cost! Also, we informed our hostel (for those who are curious, it is Nomads All Nations Hotel in Melbourne) about the bedbugs, and made sure we had a new room for the next nights. The manager is still supposed to speak with us – we deserve something for that disgusting ordeal! Our dinner was awesome and we spent the night in a fresh, non-bed-bugged bed!
For Sunday, we had an all-day trip planned to Phillip Island, this tiny island about 140 kilometers away from Melbourne. Henk heard about the island his first time in Oz, and knew it had a ton of wildlife to see, but had never gone himself. We booked onto a tour that would drive us first to a wildlife reserve, serve us a gourmet sandwich lunch, bring us to a farm, and then finally end the day on Phillip Island -- watching the 'penguin parade' and having a pizza dinner. Sounded awesome! And it was. Here's how the day went:
First, we had a 40 minute drive out to the 32,000 acre wildlife reserve. It wasn't too scenic a drive -- well, to be honest, I wouldn't know because I was sleeping/resting on Henk's lap the entire time! Anyways, I woke up just in time to jump out of the van, and have a snake put around my neck! What a wake-up call. :P
We had arrived at Moonlit Sanctuary. One of the first animals we saw was a lace monitor, which looks like a large lizard. The female lays her eggs in termite mounds, and then the termites close up the mounds keeping the egg safe inside and incubated at a constant temperature. The young hatch after 8 to 9 months and the female lace monitor returns to dig them back up. Next we saw some wild birds, including one slightly blue feathered bird that is carnivorous called a Kookaburra and a very cool ‘Egyptian-eye’ bird. We saw a koala again, this one however was asleep. And!! We saw a dingo for the first time – and decided that our first dog will be a cross-breed of a dingo and a husky.
One of the highlights of our animal adventure was feeding emus! Henk fed the emu, and then forced me to feed the emu – which was kinda scary! Look at my reaction when the emu snapped at the food in my hand. Freaky! It looked like a mini dinosaur was about to attack. Next we crossed through a bunch of yellow-beaked geese to get to another famous Australian animal: the wombat!
Wombats looked like giant fluffy guinea pigs, but they are actually marsupials because they have a pouch for their Joey (in Australia, baby animals which don’t have an official name are called Joeys). We learned something awesome about their tailbones. They have a thick bone about half an inch under their fur that they use for protection from predators.
For example, if a dingo was chasing a wombat, the wombat would run into a burrow in the ground with its behind in the air. First it would have the dingo pry at its behind, then, once the dingo realizes there is a thick bone in the way, the wombat would create a little space for the dingo to get its head into the burrow. Once the dingo shoves itself in the burrow, the wombat would push its behind up, crushing the neck of the dingo or at the very least suffocating it. The thick wombat bone also protects the wombat’s Joey in case of a car accident – so always check for a young Joey inside a wombat’s pouch if you hit one on the road!
My personal favorite animal was next! Wallabies! These cute little animals looked kinda like chinchillas with larger legs and ears. They are less than 2 feet tall standing on their hind legs, and many of them had little Joeys still in their pouches! Awesome!! Henk and I got to feed a bunch of them, and I even got to feed one of the Joeys because the mother realized I wasn’t a threat. Their larger relatives, the kangaroos, were a little further into the park. These were a bit bigger than I had imagined them, standing at around 5 feet tall. We fed the kangaroos the rest of our animal feed, and then walked back towards the park entrance to get some lunch ourselves. Just sandwiches, but we were pretty hungry so we ate them up. On our walk back we tried to lure the Tasmanian devil out of its cage, but it wasn’t interested in showing its face. Sad!
Our next stop was on Churchill Island at a working farm from the late 1800’s. We pet some of the animals, and watched a trained dog run around some ducks. I also chased after some sheep, unsuccessfully trying to catch one of them. After the farm, we made a quick stop at a chocolate factory (our driver’s awesome suggestion!) to grab some free samples and buy a chocolate lizard to snack on. Then we finally got to Phillip Island at around 4:30 pm. We had some free time to walk around reading information about seals and penguins, because our ‘Penguin Parade’ show didn’t start until around 6:30 pm. We learned that ‘Korri ‘Yong’ is the Aboriginal tribe Bunurong’s name for Phillip Island, a name which means ‘Sandy Place.’ As we were leaving the information center, we were shocked by the number of seagulls all over the place!
The ‘Penguin Parade’ is a daily event during which the tiniest species of penguins (called the ‘Little Penguins’) standing at just over a foot tall each, come ashore after a multi-day fishing trip. They waddle in groups across the beach over the course of an hour, moving quickly towards their burrows which can sometimes be up to over a mile away. Henk and I found a good spot to sit, waiting for the penguins to come. They arrived a bit later than expected, around 6:45 pm (the penguins come in depending on the time the sun sets) and started to move clumsily towards us. We saw a group of about ten penguins stumbling slowly but carefully over a bunch of rocks, rather than taking the smooth path on either side of the rocks. Silly little buggers!
After seeing a few dozen of them crossing, we headed back to the walkway which ran alongside the area the penguins were waddling. Here we got to see a bunch of them up close! We couldn’t take any pictures however, since flash photography could disorient the penguins. Penguins are quite funny when they are disoriented however. We learned from our guide earlier in the day, that these little penguins ‘fight’ with each other for the best burrow spots – and they ‘beat’ each other up: one penguin will grab another penguin under its little flipper arm and run in circles to ‘spin’ the other penguin. Then, the attacker penguin would let go, leaving the other penguin confused and disoriented, walking in circles dizzily. Such a cute way of fighting!
As we were leaving the parade, we saw a sign to check under the car for little stray penguins. Some of the penguins have a habit of crossing over the car-park on the way back to their burrows… and we don’t want to squash them under the tires! Once we had seen the penguins, we stopped off for our pizza dinner. Yum! We chatted with a few fellow passengers while we filled our stomachs with free pizza, and then got back on the bus for the 2 hour drive back to Melbourne. A long day, but well worth it!
On Monday, Henk and I planned to take a tour of Town Hall, hopefully learning a bit more about the founding of Australia – which in perspective was pretty recent. But first we walked through some of the interesting shopping streets and stopped off in Federation Square to admire some of the cool architecture. We saw that there was an event going on: the AFL’s (Australian Football League) finals are coming weekend, so several companies were giving away freebies; others had us guessing how many footballs were stashed in a car to win that car/ tickets to the AFL finals. We even got some free Vegemite (bitter tasting jelly), which tasted horrible. Henk took pictures of the view over the Square, which is located right next to St. Paul’s Cathedral.
As we made our way towards Town Hall, we saw another major train station, Flinders Street Station, on the corner. We jumped on the 1:00 pm tour, which ended up being just three people besides our guide! First we were led through the halls and were shown paintings/drawings of Melbourne both early and late in its ‘growth.’ Basically, Melbourne went from all grasslands to high-tech city in just 40 years! Pretty much exploded out of nowhere. The streets were designed to be 30 meters wide, quite large for a city of that day. It paved the way for the tram system, put in by Americans, that is still in place today (and used by tourists and locals alike!)
We learned the meaning behind Melbourne’s city crest – which included a kangaroo looking over its shoulder. Our guide explained this was because a kangaroo can only move (hop) forwards, and as the city would move forward, they would still need to look to the past for guidance. The highlight of our tour was a sneak-peek behind the huge organ in the large auditorium/ball-room. It was massive; 8000 different sized pipes in total, and controlled by 5 keyboards. Finally, our tour concluded with a walk out onto the famous balcony where years ago the Beatles waved to their massive crowd of 40 thousand fans.
Right after our tour ended, we made our way to the Koorie Cultural Heritage Centre, where we spent the next couple of hours. There wasn’t too much to see, which was kinda disappointing, but we sat around for a while watching little video clips of modern Aboriginals explaining the ways of their people. Aboriginals are extremely dark-skinned people with prominent features such as a heavy brow-bone and wide noses. They were a mostly nomadic people that had hand-made weapons such as greenstone axes (much like New Zealand Maori!) and boomerangs, and they created unique music with didgeridoos.
Unfortunately, the arrival of European colonialists – much like with the Native Americans – decimated their population. Aboriginals were first massacred by settlers (killing off 10% of their people) and then plagued with smallpox (which killed off more than 80% of their people.) This resulted in the near loss of an entire culture, which probably explains the lack of information at the cultural center. Sad story…
That evening, we returned to the Pancake Parlour for more pancakes and more free internet! On our way out we found a fun-house mirror, which resulted in this awesome picture.
The next morning we started by jumping on the free city tram which passed by some of Melbourne’s interesting artwork, such as ‘cow in a tree!’ We were on our way to Queen Victoria’s Market – which has over 2000 stands of fresh foods, including meats, fish, fruits, vegetables, breads and cheeses! There were also tons of souvenir items and random junk for sale. Henk and I decided to have a fruit and cheese ‘platter’ for dinner, after sampling some deliciously creamy cheese at one of the stands: Tilba Club Cheese! Yum! We bought some mini mandarin oranges, grapes, sweet strawberries, and a quarter wheel of Tilba cheese. Then we made our way to the bread stand to pick up a loaf of sourdough ciabatta. Before we left the market, we tried an Australian banana (dried and covered with honey – we think – and tasted a lot like raisin!).
Henk and I headed back to the hostel to see if our new card had arrived – it hadn’t. We would have to wait until 9 pm that night to see if we could rebook our flight for a day later. We left the hostel again, making a quick stop at the Exhibition Centre. Since nothing was on, we grabbed the tram out to St. Kilda, a suburb of Melbourne. This area is rather famous for its artsy nature, and Henk had said it was a nice area, so I really wanted to see it.
But before we explored the area, we stopped off in a pharmacy to see if we could get something for Henk to put on the huge red bumps (which we assumed were bites because they itched a ton) which he had since our first night in Melbourne. The woman working there took one look at Henk’s bumps and went to grab some tablets for him to take. ‘Yeah, those are bedbug bites,’ she told us, ‘which are really common in the hostels in the cities.’ Ewww! We realized we had been sleeping with bedbugs for the past 7 nights! SO NASTY! The tablet stopped Henk’s itching right away, so our fears were confirmed.
The two of us walked down St. Kilda’s pier, which provided a great view of the city. Next we made our way down the Esplanade to Luna Park, an amusement park where it is free to walk around, but you have to pay cash per ride. We didn’t want to waste any money on rides, but luckily Henk found us a racecar game that had 4 credits left in it! We each got to play twice, while taking pictures of some of the old-school games in-between.
After Luna Park, we walked down Acland Street and got some award-winning ice-cream at ‘Trampoline,’ while looking through the windows at fancy little cakes and tarts. The street was pretty cool – there were colorful mosaic decorations and fascinating shops. Lots of fun walking around that area! But we were still hoping our card would show up, and we were pretty hungry and eager for our fruit and cheese platter dinner so we left soon after.
Since our card had still not arrived, we called AA One World and re-booked to fly a day later than planned. How convenient! Even a night before our flight, with our Around-The-World special ticket, we can still reschedule at no extra cost! Also, we informed our hostel (for those who are curious, it is Nomads All Nations Hotel in Melbourne) about the bedbugs, and made sure we had a new room for the next nights. The manager is still supposed to speak with us – we deserve something for that disgusting ordeal! Our dinner was awesome and we spent the night in a fresh, non-bed-bugged bed!
