You ''canhot'' be serious

Melbourne. Saturday Jan 31. 7pm

Melbourne is so hot- too hot. Having never experienced 45c before I now realise that sitting in a sweltering UK summer traffic jam without air-con is a mere trifle. What makes this even more difficult to experience is the wind. When the north wind blows, it has already scoured 3000 miles of scorched outback and as a result feels like you are walking around with a body sized hairdryer blowing at your body.
It’s the second highest temperature ever recorded in Melbourne. The record was a mere 57c.........

Late night visit to the scary Luna Park

However, it is nothing that a cold beer cannot relieve, or more appropriately for the last few days, a freshly made mojito!
We have a had social couple of weeks since getting here: Lu’s former work colleague Sarah and hubby Dave have been so helpful and also revealed a couple of Melbournes little late night gems; the Diamantes, Anthony, Adriana and the kids, were great Australia day hosts and also introduced us to a couple more late night establishments; with Caro Salthouse and mother, aka Myles’ sis and mum, we shared a few glasses of fizz in honour of their brother in Geneva; while Johnny, Indra, Mish and Tash who have now finished their trip, joined us for a birthday lunch at the beautiful Royal Botanical Gardens.

Australia with the Diamantes

Melbournes cool way of honouring is favourite sons (and daughters)

The Aussie Open tennis has been the backdrop to our stay. It totally justifies it’s name as ‘The Peoples Grand Slam’ and is so accessible and a lot of fun. We have been a lot, from the first day when Olivia in particular sweltered but fortunately had her Nintendo in her bag, to last night’s unbelievable 5 1/2 hour Spanish semi final which finished around 1am. The atmosphere was electric and I doubt not one person left early nor wanted the match to finish.

The Grand Slam of Asia/ Pacific

Tonight sees Ang head back home to England, tomorrow Federer / Nadal, which we shall watch on the big screen in Federation Square. On Monday we will bid farewell to Melbourne, hello to Mavis our campervan again, followed by an overnight ferry to Tasmania. The adventure continues......

Auntie Ang!

Melbourne, Sunday January 18th, 8.00am

After 92 days we finally bade farewell to Mavis. Over that time we have had a scary motorway blowout, seen the canopy ripped off in a cyclone, a burglary (back to that in a minute), made and unmade our beds 92 times and had numerous electrical problems to name but a few of the unexpected delights of hiring a motorhome. But we have also travelled down almost 4000km of majestic coastline, seen some amazing places and met some fab people. To think we are only just over half way through our trip.
The last week has been one of contrasts- from the beautiful Wilsons Prom to the rather downmarket Phillip Island, followed by Melbourne which on day 3 is still taking our breath away.

After a short but really interesting stop at Buchans cave, we made it to Wilsons Prom.

Buchans Cave

Watching the surf on Squeeky Beach, Wilsons Prom

Wilsons Promontory is a huge nature reserve on Australia’s most southerly tip, run by Victoria’s Park Service. There are no settlements and the only residents are the park rangers and numerous kangaroos, koalas, emu and wombats. The sea is as deep a blue as any we can remember from our trip. The park service run a small campsite at a place named Tidal River which is so popular amongst Victorians at this time of the year that places are balloted 6 months before. However, we discovered quite by accident that there 16 camp spots held each night for out-of-state and non-Aussie visitors. The ‘Lucky Luceys’ as we have often named ourselves on this trip, got one of the 16 spots and we spent a wonderful 2 days in the park. It got hot- close to 40c on both days- and was very relaxed.

View from our camp on Wilsons Prom

Each evening after dark a very enterprising chap ran an incredibly popular cinema screen showing the ‘latest’ movies to campers and any passing wombats, who seem take great interest in cinema goers food- especially popcorn!

We bade farewell yet again to a place we did’nt want to leave and plugged in Philip Island to our aussie accented navman- who Olivia now impersonates with an eerie accuracy. ‘Turn right in 300 metres......’
Apart from being 90km from Melbourne and home to the Aussie Moto GP, so attracting thousands of city visitors each year, Philip Island’s real fame is as the home of a 60,000 strong colony of ‘Little Penguins’ who each evening at sun set, gather in the surf after a days fishing to make the perilous journey across the beach back to their burrows. This procession has become a major tourist attraction but one is managed to have minimal impact on the animals, a objective it meets very well.
We then spent an afternoon packing the van up before it’s return. How we managed to get everything in it I cannot understand, but more worryingly how are we going to get everything back in another van in 2 weeks time and then finally reduce our baggage to 25kg each for the flight home? That will be a challenge of Krypton Factor proportions.
Melbourne. Our apartment is majestic. The 14th and top floor of a building on the banks of the Yarra river overlooking not only the main shopping street and arts centre, but also the Botanical gardens, the MCG and most importantly of all, Flinders Park and the Rod Laver Arena, the home of the Aussie Open tennis. The city is buzzing.

On our balcony with the cbd behind.

Saturday 17th January dawned not only on Maddie and Georgia’s 13th birthday but also as the day the secret we have carried with us since leaving home could finally be revealed. ‘Auntie Ang’ was flying half way round the world to join us and the girls did not have a clue. When the apartment door was opened at about 10am to reveal Ang holding a 13 candle cake the shock left them utterly speechless, for about 5 seconds, then mayhem broke out. Maddie screamed, Georgia, mum, dad and Ang cried, whilst Olivia did the splits!

13th Birthday girls....

Chicks in the city...

She will be with us for the next 2 weeks.

On a final note, the stolen handbag.....
Lu’s close friend and former work colleague, Sarah, who we haven’t seen for 10 years but hails from and lives in Melbourne, called us earlier in the week to say she ‘had’ the handbag. Via a long series of events it had arrived on her doorstep, looking a little weather bedraggled but still containing the purse and credit card, Olivias prescription shades, some make up, old family photos and a screwdriver(!)
We were gobsmacked.
Take care
Andy

I shall go no farther.....

Saturday 10th January, Mallacoota

Olivia’s pronouncement earlier today mid way through yet another coastal walk as she sat on a particularly sunny clifftop.
I think however she expressed something we are all feeling after a particularly exhausting couple of weeks – since we left Byron on Boxing day in fact.
We have covered many miles and crammed much into a relatively short space of time, but now with Melbourne beckoning– 16 days in a lovely city centre apartment, 10 minutes walk from the tennis and 200m from the main shopping street- we need a break from Mavis and driving.
Much has happened since Christmas: we spent New Years eve on the steps of the Sydney Opera house watching the fireworks; got caught in a traffic jam of UK proportions as we escaped the city heading south; spent a really interesting couple of days in what has to be the planets strangest capital city- Canberra; and met up again with Indra, Johnny, Mish and Tash who in 4 meetings have become true friends and who we will miss greatly when we finally head home.
Firstly Sydney. We figured that we are in Aus for New Year so there is only place for us to be. Unfortunately so did another 1,499,495 people.....it was pretty packed. However, having got to the city centre by about 2pm and found a great space we spent many hours eating bad fast food and drinking overpriced beer, but it was worth it. Sydney opera house and the harbour bridge are the iconic views of Australia, so seeing a great firework show silhouette them has to be a highlight of the trip. We managed to escape back to Mavis at a pretty reasonable hour and subsequently spent a pretty lazy new years day recovering in 35c heat.

Waiting for midnight....

And so to Canberra. The city was established in about 1912 and is in the middle of nowhere. Well not quite- it is mid way between Sydney and Melbourne, so avoiding territorial animosities- and that is pretty much close to the middle of nowhere!
It has a clinical feel to it. Wide freeways, lots of green space and every building seems to compete in its impressiveness, but there are no people there apart from a few fellow tourists and staff

manning the many public buildings. We were strongly recommended to visit the Australian War Memorial, so that was our first stop. Both Lu and I were quite taken aback by what proved to be an emotional couple of hours but I feel that having such a sympathetic and yet incredibly

knowledgeable tour guide contributed to that.

It compares to London’s Imperial War Museum but to be honest blows the socks off it (excuse any pun!).

Honouring Australia's war dead....

The National Gallery hosted an impressive touring Degas exhibition and an equally alluring gift shop for 3 young girls, whilst the National Portrait Gallery, which only opened last month, displayed Australia’s finest sons. From Captain Cook and many other founders through to politicians, Indigenous land rights campaigners, its famous sportsman and pop-stars, this was fascinating history in an amazing building. If you ever find yourself in Canberra.........
Back to the coast and several noticeable changes- not least the weather, which has cooled, but mainly the ocean which is at least 2-3c colder than our last time we were in it at Byron. Our speedos and bikinis have been put away and we have dusted off our fleeces and woolly pyjamas The south east corner of Aus features lots of small coastal towns, rocky outcrops, big surf and miles of golden beaches. We are seeing a lot of this as we now come off the main highway at every chance and just follow the ‘tourist routes.’ Stops at Nelligen, Batemans Bay, Merimbula, Mallacoota and soon Wilsons Prom and Phillip island should see us hit Melbourne by Friday, just in time for Mads and Geo’s 13th birthday. How old are we!

These grow so abundantly, Aussies class Agapantha's as weeds.......

The other thing we have come across is Tasmanian Camembert-nice- whilst all 3 girls have started reading with something of a voracious appetite. It is a great combo.
Take care and wrap up warm- I read that Europe is in the middle of a rather aggressive cold snap.
Andy