MELBS - 6mths

MELBOURNE: September 9 – December 16, 2012

To begin recapping the last few months, I’ll start with my birthday which was back in September. As it was my 25^th, quarter-century, I knew I wanted to do something memorable. By this stage Adrian and I had finally landed full-time work with decent pay so we were in a good place to do a weekend trip away. 

The birthday weekend actually started on the Friday, my actual birthday, with my bosses decorating the office and taking me out for lunch. In the evening, I was able to get a decent group out to go for a couple drinks.

Birthday drinks at "The Vic"

We ended up booking a tour of the Great Ocean Road and the Grampians National Park which started bright and early the next day – pick up at 7:15am. The weather was absolutely beautiful for the first day along the Great Ocean Road. We got really lucky as that time of the year for Melbourne is still pretty inconsistent with its weather.  Well, let’s be honest, the weather is always inconsistent here but I think you get what I mean. Our tour guide was an ex-German paratrooper who fell in love with Australia after some of his travels and ended up becoming a citizen 20 or so years ago. He had a real passion for nature and the Aborigine history and culture so we learned a lot. 

Our first stop was Bells Beach in Torquay which is the birthplace of surfing in Australia. It was so nice to see the ocean again and we had a chance to see some surfers out. Another stop that will hold a lot of memories was at Kennett River where we got to see our first koalas in the wild along with a colourful variety of birds! We also spent some time at Mait’s Rest in the Otway National Park, full of massive eucalyptus tress and apparently some carnivorous black snails although we never saw any.

Bells Beach

Memorial Arch, the beginning of The Great Ocean Road

Koala spotting at Kennett River

Close up - isn't he cuuute?

Photo opp at Mait's Rest

The afternoon was spent visiting the more well-known parts of the Great Ocean Road – the Twelve Apostles, Loch Ard Gorge and London Bridge. Erosion has done some real damage on this stretch. Although there were never Twelve Apostles, the number of them has decreased because of erosion. And London Bridge is no longer a bridge. 

Some of the "Twelve Apostles"

Some more

Other neat rock formations by the Twelve Apostles

Loch Ard Gorge

London 'Bridge'

That evening we stayed in Halls Gap in the Grampians National Park. We arrived around 10pm pretty exhausted after a day of touring but we had one last siting before we were off to bed – a grey kangaroo jumped in front of our bus just as we were parking, another wild animal first!

 

The next morning was another early one – breakfast at 6:30am and off for some more kangaroo spotting. There was a field just behind the hostel we stayed at that had tons of them as well as some wallabies! From there, we started a hike up to Chautauqua Peak.

Kangaroos in the field. The middle one has a joey in it's pouch.

Our first wallaby siting, also with a joey

At the top of Chautauqua Peak

We then continued the tour checking out the Brambuk Aboriginal Cultural Centre and site seeing of the “Jaws of Death” (now know as “The Balconies” after a Japanese film crew fell off), Reed’s Lookout and the McKenzie Falls.

"Jaws of Death" on the left and the view

McKenzie Falls

That was pretty much it for the second and final day other than stopping at one of Australia’s oldest wineries for some wine tasting. We tried a red sparkling wine, something I didn’t even know existed but is apparently a popular holiday wine. I think I enjoyed it…it was just so different to any other wine I had tried before.

Overall, an amazing tour and a very memorable birthday! It was tough to go back to work the next day. Adrian and I just wanted to continue our traveling!

  

 ~

The end of October we had another weekend away for the Australian Motorcycle Grand Prix. One of Adrian’s workmates volunteers for the event and was nice enough to give us some free tickets for admission and camping. Apparently this is an annual event the workmate and his friends attend so we set up camp with them.

The weekend event was held at the permanent track on Philip Island so once again it was nice to get out of the city for a bit. And after seeing friends’ photos on Facebook of camping this past summer, it was fun to do a bit of our own, even if the weather wasn’t the greatest.

Not sure what I was getting myself into, I soon learned that it was more or less a guys’ weekend to embrace the bogan lifestyle. Their wives used to come but have since opted for weekend spa trips. The guys were friendly and welcoming anyway and overall it was a fun time. I just had to adopt a bit of selective hearing!

The track with some bikes coming around the corner, practically horizontal!

Trackside Campground

Watching the final race from the hill

~

We didn’t get up to anything for Halloween as Australia doesn’t really do anything for it. There were a few bars and restaurants that dressed up for the day or hosted parties but nothing compared to North America.

The beginning of November marked 1 year away from home. Multiple people told us the year would fly and before you know it you’ll be heading home. Well it sure has flown but we still have a bunch of traveling to do! It’s been fun reflecting on all of our experiences and how much we have grown, individually and as a couple. And the number of photos we have accumulated is amazing! I don’t know how my parents did a similar without a digital camera! There are so many memories, whether in photos or in our heads and hearts, and still so many to make.

~

 

The beginning of December our flatmates Jess and Ewan began traveling again so we had to say good-bye. It was a bit sad after living together for 4 months but I guess that’s something you have to deal with as a backpacker. After they left we were hoping to have the place to ourselves for the holiday season but instead we got two evenings to ourselves before new flatmates moved in. It’s been alright for the most part although at times it feels a bit like a hostel with so many people coming around. It’s two girls as opposed to a couple but they are nice and clean and pretty easy to get along with.

Parting photo with Jess & Ewan

Work has been pretty good for both of us. Just recently Adrian has been hired on directly by the company instead of continuing work with the job agency so that has been a nice change. On top of the frustrations we wrote about last time, Adrian found out he was supposed to be getting paid overtime and when bringing this up with the job agency they agreed.  But after advising a couple times he would get paid this, his pay checks did not reflect overtime and he hadn’t received back pay. After waiting almost 5 weeks to see this money, he filed a complaint with the Aus government and has recently been advised he should see this money on Wednesday, totaling almost $2,000!

Work for me has been good. I could do without the PA aspects but I am still enjoying the job for the most part. It’s been busy lately with clients wanting branded merchandise and gifts for the holiday season.

At times throughout the past few months we have been feeling a bit anxious, homesick and frustrated with being in a sort of limbo stage in life. While we are trying to make the most of our time working and living in Melbourne, we struggle a bit with wanting to be traveling OR wanting to be home to work on our careers and spend time with family and friends.

It’s been real nice to have Megan from back home out here to spend time with though and Paul, our English friend we originally met in New Zealand, has returned to work after traveling the East Coast a bit.

They will also make Christmas a million times better than the one we had last year. Last year we felt isolated on Slipper Island, working for food and accommodation. The owners were nice enough to welcome us for Christmas Day lunch with their family and “Santa” gave us some presents but it just didn’t have the Christmasy vibe and it was missing some key Christmas elements. Not a very enjoyable first Christmas for the two of us.

In preparation for Christmas this year, I have gone out and bought a cheap Christmas tree and decorations for our place as well as some advent calendars. This weekend we will have some friends over for an early Christmas brunch then head to the beach for the day. Christmas Day will probably be the same with an extra supper meal together. We’re really looking forward to it!

Our Christmas tree

We also have some other things to look forward to with our time off during the holidays – Boxing Day cricket test match, beach days, Summadayze New Year’s Day music festival with MIA , Fedde Le Grand, etc., …

Just last night actually we experienced our first professional cricket match although this was a newly formatted 20-20 cricket match. It’s a much more fast-paced and entertaining version of the game of cricket and we loved it! Not only was the sport itself new for us and fun to watch, the match had “Americanized” elements such as music throughout the match, wickets that lit up when hit, cheerleaders on a stage within the stands that had strobe lights, and we all got “Melbourne Stars” branded stress balls in the shape of a cricket ball.

Left to Right - Paul, Dana, Adrian, Priya (new flatmate) and Josh (Adrian's workmate)

A bowl from Malinga

The Boxing Day test match will be much quieter but we’re always up for watching sports, especially ones we wouldn’t see back home.

As we mentioned last post, our plans always seem to change and that remains true. It now looks like we will begin our traveling again mid March. A couple more months of work until we will walk, hike, swim, bus, train, snorkel anywhere we can in the South Pacific!