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With aching muscles, we jumped onto the Greyhound that would take us the 10 hours down to Sydney, where we had a hostel booked for just a few hours before our flight to Melbourne. The coach turned up an hour and a half late to decrease this time even more. It then ended up taking an extra hour to get there, so we arrived at our hostel at 3am, needing to be at the airport at 5am.
The hostel receptionist couldn't believe we were going to be there for just a few hours but kindly upgraded us to a private room as we didn't want to wake those in the dorm room.
When we took our seats on the plane I (matt) passed out straight away and only remember landing in Melbourne. We weren't 100% sure who to be looking for at the airport but, luckily, Ashley leapt towards us and helped us get our bags. Facebook can be a handy thing.
Ashley and his family live in a place called Werribee, one of the suburbs of Melbourne. The house is huge, which is a good job with so many people here now, but he still insisted on giving us the master bedroom with ensuite and Jacuzzi. Since we arrived, the whole family haven't stopped showing their hospitality towards us.
The first port of call after dropping our bags off, was a bit of Aussie-British heritage. Ashley took us to Chirnside house, an enormous stately home built by the then owners of the town. We took the tour of the house and then he asked us if we would prefer a coffee or a glass of wine... silly question!
A short trip down the road, we sampled the wines of the vineyard before settling on a bottle and sharing it over a plate of delicious cheese and meats, it's a hard life for a backpacker!
That evening we were taken into the city centre where Ashley had some tickets for us to go up one of the tallest buildings in the southern hemisphere. As you can imagine, the views from the 89th floor were pretty good and we even got to go on 'The Edge' experience (a frosted glass box which hangs over the edge of the tower and clears when you're inside). The accompanying sounds of creaking and cracking made Pip's legs a little jelly-like but we still got a good picture.
Once back on terra firma, we walked to the Crown Plaza. It was very Christmassy here, especially with the carol singers and an enormous ginger bread house. The whole building was pretty spectacular with large marble pillars, a grand sweeping staircase, luxury spa, over 200 bars/restaurants and some very poshly dressed staff and guests. The four of us looked a little out of place!
After this we headed back to the car along the riverside soaking in the evening atmosphere and seeing what Melbournites do best; socialising. The bars were full with after work drinkers, the pavements made way to street artists and activities and a fire show even takes place every hour where huge fire balls erupt from pillars alongside the river.
We spent the next day splashing about in the pool with Taus and getting some washing done.
Ashley and Diane took us back into the city the following evening, intending to take us to the aquarium. Unfortunately, it was closed by this time so instead we were given an introduction to casinos. Our luck was clearly not in though and we gave up after a couple of slot machines.
On Christmas Eve, Ash took us west via Geelong and onto the Great Ocean Road, an incredibly long road which twists and turns beside the ocean amongst some amazing scenery. To prepare for the epic journey, we needed an epic breakfast, which Ashley duly delivered at a hotel in Geelong. The coastline was breathtaking in places which makes some pretty good roads for driving. The drive back via an inland route was almost as spectacular but after about 250km of driving, we were all pretty tired so we relaxed and waited for Santa.
Christmas morning we awoke to find Santa's snowy footprints on the carpet where he had come in and left Taus' presents in the lounge. We watched as he opened his new toys and were touched by the kindness of the family when we found out they had all got us a few gifts too.
After wolfing down a few chocolates, we were taken by Ash to meet his siblings on the other side of town. Once again, we were welcomed with open arms into their home and they were only too pleased to find out more about their distant relatives back in England. We managed to get a few pictures of the whole clan and have a bit of a chat before shooting off to tend to the Christmas dinner back at Ash's.
Unbeknownst to us, we got out just in time. Not long after we left, a freak storm hit the area, with hailstones the size of golfballs destroying several of their cars and, worst of all, their roof. Hopefully the insurance will cover all the costs.
Christmas dinner was a big one! There were four different types of roast meat on offer so, of course, we had to have some of each. Some turkey, chicken, beef and pork later and we were stuffed! We spent that evening being plied with alcohol by Ashley and playing Texas hold 'em poker (won in emphatic fashion by Ash Jnr.) Later that evening, we taught them some of the drinking games we had picked up on our travels and at uni, which they all found hilarious and vowed to take to their new year's party.
Whilst some of the family went off to the Boxing Day sales with rough heads, Pip and I had a brief lie in and then went down to see the start of the prestigious Boxing Day test. This year, the Aussies are taking on India.
In the afternoon, we all headed into the city to see the aquarium. They had a new penguin exhibition with a large swimming area which was fantastic. There was also an enormous shark and stingray tank which you could walk through at two points. Samantha and her boyfriend Jimmy kindly bought us the mugshot pictures we had had taken at the start of the aquarium.
Afterwards, we went to the docklands shopping district before heading to China town for a Chinese meal. As Ash said, you know a good Chinese restuarant by the amount of Chinese people eating there, and this place was crammed with them.
Today, we came downstairs to have a lovely cooked breakfast made for us by Ash (we could get used to being guests) and then watched a bit of the cricket. Even Pip is starting to get the gist of the rules! Ash continued the trend of cooking for us by making a barbecue this afternoon, which included KANGAROO steaks! They were delicious and are apparently quite cheap and very lean, we can't understand why more people don't eat them or why the Aussies don't export the meat much.
The day we arrived, Ash had told us he'd booked some gold class cinema tickets for us. We had thought this meant the premier seats at the back of the cinema like we have back home... oh no... We were directed to our luxury reclinable armchairs, in a private cinema with only 24 seats for the other gold class ticket holders, no peasants allowed. The waiter told us to buzz should we want anything from the bar to drink or any of the meals from the menu. We watched a film called 'War Horse' whilst enjoying a glass of red wine and pretty much lying down. The film was brilliant and the whole experience is sure to make us unable to go the peasant cinema ever again.
Tomorrow is pencilled in as a chill out day, with the opportunity of going in the pool no doubt. The rest of the family have also mentioned that they may come round in the evening. Pip says we will get the pictures up tomorrow Pat.
Every molecule in our body doesn't want to leave this star treatment and go back to the backpacker lifestyle but it's almost time to head to Sydney for New Year's. If we don't blog before then, we wish you all a happy new year, especially Tom and Abbey, whom we can finally congratulate on their engagement and Pete and Jan, who recently tied the knot. Great news guys!
Happy New Year!
- comments
Louise Heinrich Loved reading your blog even though I don't know you guys. I stumbled onto this as I'm hoping to use this site for our trip to the USA in a couple of days time. If hosteling isn't you thing try airbnb. A website for people who are willing to open their homes to list rooms apartments or houses. Worth a try. Hope the rest of the trip goes well. Make sure you see the fireworks on Sydney harbour on New Years Eve along with 500,000 or more other people. Best fireworks I've ever seen and great family atmosphere.