Melbourne 2007, birthdays, bread baking, windfarms & Al Gore

What a month! It started last month with an invite from Cathy in Melbourne to attend her 40th party, then got a bit more hectic when I needed to arrange a work meeting in Onslow (about 2000kms north of Perth) for the end of the month, then I had a bright idea that Tracy and I wouldn't tell Cathy we were both visiting which added to some logistically manovering and on top of me wanting to visit 3sets of friends located in opposing directions to each other, two art galleries, undertake a whole day bread baking course at a Convent, attend the 40th party, go to 2 markets and relax into only 5 days... But then September become totally out of control when I was accepted to train as an Al Gore Climate Change Presenter in Melbourne, no less and the very next weekend after Cathy's 40th... sweet :)

So on a very late night in September Tracy and I, without any sleep boarded a 747 at 11.25pm for Melbourne approx 4000kms away (3.5hours)... Whilst I was tired I have no idea what Tracy was running on, the girl had just completed nightshift (Nurse), flown to Hopetoun (500kms south of Perth), packed up a friends camp and driven back to Perth, then returned to work for 2 days... in the middle of this she completed two uni assignments and is arranging her own trip to Italy in October!

The flight was as always uneventful. We landed groggy and in need of coffee... It was 5am Melbourne time, 3am Perth time... We took the skybus to the CBD, stuffed our luggage in a locker, including a bottle of red wine and went for walk along the Yarra - waiting for Melbourne to wake up on Friday the 14th Sept.

I like Melbourne. Not more than Perth nor less then Sydney. Its just that I like it as a city, its alive, has great allayways, is old & new, modern and rustic, grotty and flash. Best of all I can get a coffee at 6am at a great cafe on the Yarra river and watch the workers arrive... This is not so easy to do in Perth... but we are thinking about it. 2nd best of all, my chai soya latta is automatically served with honey :)

We stayed nattering at the caffee for a few hours - then in need of loos and realising it was now almost 10am we took off the the Pixia 20years of Annimation.. If it come to your city - you must go... Its more adult than kid and very interesting.. Thought it was th 10-minute annimated movie, whilst reclining on the floor that made me realise I was both very tired and need of food... So off to the Vic Markets for food... Yummy!

A bit of impromtu shopping and time to catch train to Belgrave to visit friends.. Now we manged to refind Southern Cross (Spenser Street) train station and the locker with all our stuff... even found the code to open it... We took all our stuff out... packed the extra stuff we had into the bags, luggeged them all to Flinders Street Station (Don't ask), caught the train on platform 9 to Belgrave and as our train rolled through Southern Cross Station - Tracy asked if Ii had the bottle of wine with me... yep you guessed it the answer was nope! Carried all the way from Perth... bugger...

We can get another one - perhaps they sell Margaret River reds in Melbourne?

Struth its cold in Victoria! I thought we were both going to die waiting for Ana to collect us from the train station... It was so cold! As much as I love the culture of Melbourne - I don't think I can give up the sunshine of Perth! Great night was had by all - with Michael playing his trumpet and Phillip teach us card tricks :)

Alas Tracy & I had to leave mid morning and by the time it came around it was all a bit of rush - didn't help me leaving my jacket and having to go back. Peter had given Tracy & I a replacement bottle of wine and with all the rushing of getting into the car and on to the train it was a couple of stops before, yet again Tracy & I relised we had left a 2nd bottle of wine - this time at least still in Peter & Ana's house... We decided we would try our luck and check out the locker from yesterday - just in case it was there...

1st we booked in to the Greenhouse Backpackers, dumped our things and took off to the Rose Street Markets Fitzroy, via Southern Cross Station. Now as you all know when you have lost something and you are approaching the location - very hopeful it will still be there, yet trying not to get to excited in case its not.. We were laughing at our sillyness... 1st thing the locker was not being used, 2nd thing you can actually open them if they are not being use... and 3rd thing if you're ever at Southern Cross Station i highly recomend you open every unlocked locker and check in the front right hand side corner for a bottle of red - because if you are as lucky as we are you'll fine one...Not ours thought as we now have it back ;)

So from here it was take the tram to Fitzroy - which involved some wonderful conversations trying to work out which stop to get off at... as luck would have it we were told the wrong stop number, but ignored it when I actually saw the sign for Rose Street. the markets are small, quant and well worth a visit. We had lunch there - very nice and wanded around the craft - mostly clothes... Then it was time to hunt down some pink laces for my purple steelcaped boots... Need these for the Onslow trip... A coffee at the wonderfull cafes and a glass of wine (oops that was two) and oops we had better get back to the Green house & have a nap before the 40th. Cathy was to meet us at the backpackers around 5.30pm..

After two glasses of wine we were in need of a nana nap.. this was attempted but too much light & noise to actually fall asleep... Cathy sms she was here at 5.30pm ish So I wandered down to show her were we wer staying...The room we had was only 4 bed and it had a wall dividing the bnks up, so Tracy was able to hide... I don't think I will every forget Cathy's surprise and holler when Tracy wandered how and said 'Hi'... Good on you Cathy it was a moment I'll always treasure... We all got ready and tok offf at a brisk pace to the Crown for a competitive and interactive game of ten pin bowling... What at hoot - haven't played the game in years... After and attempt to find a nightclub in Melbourne that played music we all knew, which involved catching 4 trams! We gave up and returned to one of the bars at the crown... A particular highlight is the fire flames that are our the front along the river... One is able to get a suntan from the heat they generate... Complete waste of gas and I'm sure with some effort I could calculate the CO2 emissions... but it was specky... IT was 2am before we made it back to the Greenhouse... Oops have to get up at 6am!

Surprisingly waking up wasn't that bad. I might have to drink Burbon more offen or perhaps it was the Coke a Cola fix that the burbon was mixed with... etiher way... Cathy, Tracy & I had made it, using a Taxi to the Abbortford Convent on the Yarra river by 7.45am.. We had our 1st Coffee for the day and some food, met the other ladies and baker... Yep this was going to be a great day.


BREAD BAKING
What a hoot - we slaved, sweated and eat well this day... Too well at the end of the day, between the 3 of us we had made the following:

3 dozon scones
3 family pizza with toppings to die for
3 loves of white sour dough bread
3 loves of rye sour dough bread
3 loves of white bread
3 dozon small bread rolls
3 apple & custard rolls

Needless to say it was too much food to try to fit into Cathy's home fridge.. so on the way home, with all our food bundled into 100kg flour sack's we frantically used our mobile phones to find a refuge to take our home cooking.. This was located in South Yarra and we took off to deleiver our goodies in pooring rain (so Melbourne). The refuge were very pleased with our efforts. We did keep some of the bread to stuff into Cathy's fridge...

The big highlight at baking was it was Cathy's 40th. Tracy & I had bought a couple bottles of sparkling white wine to drink with our pizza lunch and everyone joined in.. Good fun. A 2nd bigger surprise was the chocolate cake the baker had arranged for Cathy at the end of the day - It was a real treat to see Cathy cry when the cake was brough out and we all sang happy birthday... It was such great fun arranging all this... And I am so so happy that both Cathy & Tracy - my two longest friends were able to be there with me.. (yep it was me who talked them both into spending a day baking bread)


[More words to come]