Holiday in Melbourne--Part 1

The beginning of October is always a two week holiday as it is the end of the school years term 3. One more term left, (Oct--Dec) and then our school is out and we have summer break/ Christmas break).

Usually we don't go on holiday until Christmas, but this term Stan was working in Melbourne so we thought we would join him. Melbourne is 10 hours south of Sydney (Yes, we drove it--and the kids were surprisingly good....ok they were amazing and the scenery was beautiful!)

Melbourne is completely different from Sydney. Melbourne is very trendy and artsy and high class cosmopolitan. . ..Where as Sydney is like a mix between Hawaii and San Fransisco. On the drive down outside of Melbourne their highway bridges were lit up with purple, red and blue lights. There were really abstract artsy statues everywhere and shimmery walls--I don't know how to describe this one. I was impressed! I like each city for different things. Melbourne uses trams and bikes (you have those rent a bike, bike racks everywhere) while Sydney uses the ferries. The water in Sydney is so tropical, while Melbourne's harbor water is very dark grey/brown with the industrial factories right on the outskirts of the city. Sydney has moved all it's industrial stuff so it seems really clean.

Stan has been working in Melbourne during the week for about 3 months so he keeps getting upgraded at his hotel (crown towers).

I no longer feel sorry for Stan staying in a hotel and missing the family. This hotel is posh. There is a plasma screen over the bathtub. When you fill up the bathtub the water creates this waterfall effect to fill up. The curtains in the room open and close with a remote! The breakfast buffet has a breakfast table that appeals to just about every culture; British (eggs, fried tomatoes, bacon, potatoes and mushrooms etc., French (platters of cheese and fresh bread and fruit), American (pancakes, French toast etc.) Asian (smoked salmon, these really spicy hot noodle things, fried rice, yum-cha dumplings etc.) Juice of every kind. I could keep going, it was pretty cool! Below is a picture of the pool--the kids swam at least once every day for a couple hours!
Accommodation aside, we also got out around the town. The first day we went to the Science Museum and the Melbourne Zoo. Stan had the day off, some kind of public holiday in NSW.

Here is Olivia going backwards on the race track, it times you against Olympians

Stan helping Thomas dunk a net ball (game in Australia, like basket ball without a net mixed with ultimate Frisbee)

Stan pushing Mary in the hover chair

Racing Olivia on the bikes

Doing the simulated airplane game

Next the Melbourne Zoo (smaller than Sydney so we didn't get tired as quickly and we could actually see the animals!) This was inside a bird arboretum, which felt more like a botanical garden.

Olivia and the Emu

Getting ready for the aquarium part

A cute little red panda fox

The second day was Olivia's birthday and we hit the aquarium (see earlier post). The third day I met up with some high school friends who moved to Melbourne earlier that week. We did some sight-seeing since neither of us had been around Melbourne and they were able to help with my kids. First, we went up the Eureka Tower which is an outlook point of Melbourne.

Wes, Candace, me & Mary (Wes and Candace went to HS with me and married each other!) Then we walked over the Yarra River to get some lunch (it rained a bit so lunch was longer than we expected).

Next we walked over to Federation Square (a really eclectic groupie of buildings with shops and exhibitions).

From there we walked back over the bridge through to parks to the Royal botanical gardens

it started to rain again so we didn't hang around long and started the walk back to the hotels. Overall I had so much fun reconnecting and hanging out with old friends. I realize now, there are about 6-8 people from my graduating class (Bozeman, MT) who live in Australia...crazy hu!