Melbourne

Sorry we are so far behind!! I got a little distracted.

There's so much to tell from our lovely time here in Melbourne. Our first few days here we were staying with our new favorite person, Robin, who reminded us that the life of a wandering minstrel, while charming, is a sacrifice of certain luxuries that we dearly miss.

Luxury one: our own bathroom. We had a huge, marble-tiled bathroom with a shower that felt like a warm waterfall. Clare went into a hygiene-induced coma in that shower and was only roused when she ran out of hot water.

Luxury two: a hair dryer. I wanted to kiss it, whisper sweet nothings into its nozzle, ask it to run away with me. There will be three days of photos with my hair down, and then no more. It was heavenly.

Luxury three: home cooked food. The night we arrived it was chilly and rainy and Robin had prepared homemade pumpkin soup and crusty bread for us. You'd think we'd never eaten before the way we attacked the pot and shoveled the food into our mouths-- a terrible first impression that Robin fortunately forgave.

We spent our first full day in Melbourne wandering around the trendy-hippy Brunswick St. which has a 90s Boys Town (pre-yuppy invasion) feel to it. It reminded me of my high school days when my idea of fashion was wearing my father's vintage 70s corduroys and a worn through t-shirt that I picked up from a resale shop on a weekend jaunt to Clark and Belmont. That little window into my past probably just blew some of your minds. We humans are devolving creatures. Anyway, we had lunch at the Veggie Bar, our new favorite vegetarian restaurant on the plant (sorry Blind Faith, you're now in second). I had a tofu burger with satay sauce on roti bread and Clare had a falafel wrap. Neither of us could speak during the meal.

After a stroll around Brunswick we took the tram down to St. Kilda's beach to watch the sunset. Clare and I are basically dating. Like with Byron Bay, I won't bother trying to explain how beautiful it was. The pictures basically say it all. We also saw some little penguins by the breakwater at St. Kilda's but they were too shy for photos.

The sky, on the other hand, was not.

That night Robin invited us to hang with some locals to watch the State of Origin game-- the big rugby game between New South Wales and Queensland. Our wonderful hosts again spoiled us with incredible home-cooked food and my very first taste of kangaroo (pizza)! It's chewy, a bit gamey, and not my favorite food ever. If that roo had just spooned with me I wouldn't have had to eat him. Lessons learned all around.

Thursday we spent the day touring vineyards in the Yarra Valley. Despite trying over 40 wines through the course of the day, we managed to learn some things about wine tasting (swirl, sniff, swish, swallow, repeat) and wine making (something about duration of skin contact and fermentation). The scenery was gorgeous and we made friends with some Irish, British and Aussies that were on the trip who shared our love of wine and our distaste for moderation.

Summary of vineyard tour:

Beginning



Middle

End

An important note worthy of its own paragraph: WE LOVE YOU ROBIN!! THANK YOU!!

Friday we had to leave our wonderful host's home and move to our (also surprisingly lovely) hostel on Flinders St. This part of town has a totally different vibe, with fun little hipster boutiques and great sandwich and coffee shops. And cupcakes! To be specific, little cupcakes. Georgetown Cupcake has got nothing on these little bits of bliss. Melbourne also takes its coffee really seriously and I have been utterly spoiled by the rich, dark espresso and perfect crema that all Melbourners expect in a cup of joe. The real adventure was figuring out how to order the coffee here. The standard cup is a "long black" which is basically a very strong Americano. A "flat white" is a latte. "Short black" is an espresso. It took a few mistries before sorting out that a "long black with a splash of milk on top" was the closest I would get to an American coffee.

Friday night we kidnapped another wandering American and we all went to the Aussie Rules "footie" game at the MCG. Educated by our errors in attending local sporting events in Japan, we decided this time we would fully embrace the event as the locals do. Clare and I got matching jerseys (Go Carlton!!) and, not to be outdone, decided to have the Carlton logo painted on our cheeks. Our compatriot one-upped us and had his entire face painted blue and white. We got in the stadium and quickly realized that nobody over the age of 10 had their faces painted. And girls apparently don't really wear jerseys here. The female fan uniform is basically a really short dress and a team scarf. Failure round two. But the game was incredibly fun despite a crushing loss to our beloved Carlton... pigeons? dingos? wombats? Honestly, they have the least inspiring team mascots you can think of over here. I think it was the toads and the cockroaches that night. How ever does one choose....

The game turned into some post-game revelry, though not (as we imagined) in bars packed with game goers celebrating a victory or drowning a sorrow. We were again the most ostentatiously spirited people in the bar. The locals would ask us who won... and why the hell we had paint on our faces. Sigh.

Saturday was largely an effort to recover from the game and prepare ourselves for our last night in Australia. We made it to the Queen Victoria Market, a vast outdoor market where people are hocking everything from fresh fruit to designer clothing at suspiciously low prices. We steered clear of the fish market and its uninviting odors-- Tokyo was enough fish market for a lifetime.

As usual, we set into Saturday evening with two simple goals: booze and karaoke. We started the evening (rather accidentally) at a karaoke bar where we were basically the only people there. A little TLC and Wham from Clare and I, followed by an inspired version of Mrs. Robinson from our American friend, got the night off to a perfect start.

Then, to brace ourselved for the impending New Zealand cold, we went to an ice bar. That's right. It's a bar. Made of ice. Sound like a really stupid idea? You are correct. Clare and I, of course, boasted that we were from Chicago, we are not afraid of a little cold. Not true. It was quite literally freezing. A few shots from an ice sculpture, a cocktail from a glass made of ice, and some eskimo photo ops later we decided we had proved our point and could move on to a warmer locale.

We ended the night in a Melbourne casino, which was basically like Vegas if all of Vegas were an off-strip, worn down, tacky room full of underage drunks and past-prime gambling addicts. After an incident at the craps table where I may have accidentally hit a nice Aussie lady in the face with dice, we decided it was time to call it a night.

Melbourne-- another success. (Success loosely defined).