Kirsten and Mark

We had a few hours to kill after the market, so we headed back to the Southbank to Eureka Tower. Here you can see our hotel. It’s is the white building by the Victoria University, and you enter from the back, far side for some reason.

Hotel and other Melbourne buildings

Eureka Tower is the tallest residential building in the Southern Hemisphere (by floor-the spire on another one is higher).  It has 92 floors and there is an observation deck on the 88th. The following pics were taken from there.

Melbourne and surrounding area

Fascinating!

Woah, it's moving!

Brit seriously loved this! He followed it around for so long.

Woooh, we're in the air

Mark and Britton went out on The Edge! It was basically a box that had  clear walls and floor that moved out from the side of the building.

Windy!

There was also a balcony that was exposed that anyone could go on, and man was it windy and cold!

Eureka Tower from the ground up

Another random art piece

It was fun seeing the city from so high. We could really see for a long way.

From the beginning of our planning, Mark could hardly wait for this:

We’d have gone on Saturday, but it was closed.

Oh Dali

The "Lips" phone is fun!

Hmmm, maybe he likes the shoe better

We couldn’t take pictures in the exhibit, but it was really good. His most famous paintings weren’t there, but it had a great collection of Salvador Dali’s art throughout his life. You could really see his changes and progression as an artist. He had a love of Hollywood and wanted to be a part of several movies, but his taste was a little too strange for mainstream America. He finally got his break in Alfred Hitchcock’s “Spellbound” He and Walt Disney worked on several projects together as well, but only one project actually came about. This is the closest thing I can find of the movie: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1462300

In my opinion, it’s still too strange for mainstream America.

After the museum, we went to the State Library of Victoria. It’s in this big old building with some steps and benches and there were a ton of people sitting around having lunch, or just hanging out.

Oh-and I don’t think I’ve mentioned, but every day on the trip there were at least 5-6 different school groups everywhere we went. Some were high school, some “grammar” and they were all in uniforms. I began to wonder if they were ever in class.

The library is really cool inside too, and has a big dome. We went up and saw some of the exhibits they had there–history or melbourne, rare books and literature, art etc. But, Brit found this:

I LOVE Buttons!!!!

It was an interactive map of Melbourne throughout its history. You could change maps, zoom in, pan etc. I think it was his favorite thing all day.

Pretty library

There are only so many things to see in a library, so we headed to the park.

Here birdie birdie

AHHH, this is soooo fun!

I'm so cute.

We tried going to the Queen Victoria Market, but unfortunately it had just closed. It’s a huge market with thousands of stalls that sell everything from food to crappy watches to clothes.

For dinner we ate at a delicious Chinese restaurant that was recommended by Mark’s friend. We loved everything. Brit really like the melt-in-your-mouth beef brisket with dumplings and the wontons. Their honey chicken was so good too. So, we’re thankful for that recommendation!

Every night was kind of early. By 8 or 9 we were so tired we all went to bed.

The Melbourne Aquarium is pretty cool because it has fish that are native to Australia and the south that you don’t see very often anywhere else. Plus it had these:

Gentoo Penguin--Fastest swimmer

King Penguins

Britton was so excited to see them!

I’ve never seen penguins with a home of snow before. It’s always been water and rock of some sort. But these actually had snow/ice. They were fun to watch swimming around too.

MoMo and Dory

We even saw Brit’s new favorite movie characters–Nemo and Dory. He was really excited to point them out.

He loved looking at all of them…I think he’s going to be just like his dad and make everyone go to every aquarium possible.

Shark and his entourage

There are so many other cool pictures that Mark took that he’ll be posting on his site soon. If I put them all, these posts would be miles long.

After the aquarium we went toward their area called The Docklands and Harbour Town. On the tram we met a family from the states (the dad was from Australia). They got off at a place that looked like a park–and we knew we had to go too. As you can see, it was a good idea.

Weeeeeeeee!

Slides are fun

"O" baby

We were a little bummed we weren’t staying closer to it because Brit would’ve loved to play all day. There were even some brightly colored stairs–kind of like bleachers–that he had to climb as well.

Karen under the "sculpture?"

Holy Cow!

Melbourners are into some interesting sculpture and art. Cow in a tree?

We continued walking for what seemed like forever and finally made it to Harbour Town where they have restaurants and shopping and just our luck–it happened to be the Grand Opening day of the first Costco in Australia!

We had to go of course, and were happy to find our card worked here as well. It was just as crowded as a Saturday at any Costco in the US. We got a few items for breakfast and snacks for the week and were happy to have such a native Australian experience.

We had great plans and hopes for Sunday. We planned to rent a car, pick up our “smart visitor cards” (where you pay 1 price that gets you into a lot of places and saves you money) then go to church, drive down to Phillip Island and see the cute Australian Animals.

Yeah. We got off to a rocky start. We stepped out of the hotel and it was FREEZING! Wind was whipping all around us and since I’m a super smart person, I packed a wrap dress. Trying to walk, while pushing the stroller and hold my dress closed was super fun. It was a bit of a wait at the car rental place, then we almost started panicking when said they were out of booster seats. With the weird English there (like calling a pack n play a cot) we thought Brit wouldn’t have a car seat–not ok. But, it was worked out and we made it out. Mark was a little unsure of driving on the wrong side of the road, but he did well. There wasn’t time to stop for the discount cards, so we headed straight to church.

When we got there the gate was closed and 1 car was in the lot. We checked the time the night before. For the THIRD time while on vacation we’ve tried to go to church and it’s been stake conference. (We’re assuming that was it, since we can’t see any other reason no one was there). Like, seriously? So, after trekking back to the hotel so some of us could change, we picked up the cards and headed out for the island.

We’re pretty sure that Brit gets car sick. He’s puked enough times now that we don’t think it’s an accident. Unfortunately, he was wearing his super cute new Rocker Roos outfit. This is the best pic I have, but there will be more coming soon.

After cleaning up the poor baby, driving through a torrential downpour of rain and possibly breaking our contract with the car company for driving on a non-paved road, we made it to Churchill Island. It’s the site of the first European agricultural pursuits and has been farmed since the 1850s. Today it is a historic working farm.

Sadly, after the koalas we couldn’t take any more pictures. We went to the Penguin Parade and there were no pictures allowed. They’re the smallest of the penguins and after swimming all day, they return to their burrows at night that are just up the beach.

We made our way down to the beach and got what we thought were great seats. It was soooooo cold! We even bought blankets. And, we were especially bummed we couldn’t have the camera because the sunset was beautiful, and the waves were huge and a really cool color of blue-green.

When they started coming ashore they came in little bunches and would ride the water in and out for 5-10 minutes before they were sure it was safe enough to cross the beach to their homes.

It looked kind of like this. They’re soooo cute! After a bit we went to watch them on the paths and as they walked home. Some lived far up off the beach–like 100 yards or so. They were very noisy calling to each other, and they all sounded different.

It was a long day, but totally worth it. We got to see lots of things unique to Australia and despite the day’s unplanned beginning, it turned out to be a lot of fun!

We went to the land down under and no, we didn’t have any vegemite. (I think the only place I saw any was on  a kids meal sandwich (with cheese–ick!) at the Melbourne Museum.

But, we did try to have many “native” experiences and blend in as much as possible. Though, since we didn’t eat at McDonalds or Subway or frequent the 7-Eleven every day, we may have failed.

I guess I’ll start at the beginning…it’s a very good place to start. We left at 11:30 pm on Thursday and arrived in Sydney at 6 am on Saturday.

Brit eagerly awaiting the flight

Brit did fairly well on the flight. It wasn’t that he was bored or restless, he was tired and had a hard time sleeping. So much for the medicine. And, he hated the “bassinet” we got for him. He was way too big for it and even if he was asleep, he’d wake up and cry. So, as long as we had a movie for him to watch or things to color, he was fine. And, unfortunately, Mark’s mom Karen wasn’t able to sit by us. For some reason they put her almost as far from us as possible on a non-full flight! But, she did get some sleep, so maybe it wasn’t so bad for her. It was nice having her there to help with Brit though.

I must say also–we’re in love. With VAustralia. Oh, it was nice. Even in regular economy. There was room, and the food was totally edible and the flight attendants were so great too. With in-seat entertainment there was always something to do too. Added note–in Australia, it’s required for “lap children” to have their own seat belt. They have what looks like a portable seat belt with a loop on it. It goes around the child, then the parent’s seatbelt goes through the loop, so the child can’t fly away if there’s a crash. Why the heck is that not required in the US? Activist friends–this is a great cause, go to work!

Going through customs in Sydney was fine, except we had to throw away all the yummy fruit and nuts we’d gotten for the plane that we didn’t eat. Boo! After arriving in Melbourne, we learn my suitcase didn’t make the flight and it would be coming on the next one. Seriously? We had lunch, waited and then took the awesome public transportation system to the city. It was Brit’s first bus ride, and when I told him we were waiting for the bus, he signed it. I had no idea he knew it (though it’s on the movie). I guess he never needed it till now.

The Grand Mercure Melbourne. Our home for a week. Nice enough. Kitchen, living room, bedroom–and a bathroom attached. We’re not ones to vacation on a vacation (sorry Karen) so after settling in a bit, we went out to experience the city.

Oh, what a city it is. The Paris of the Southern Hemisphere it’s called.

We were right across the street from this:

Flinders St. Station

A huge train station that went all over. Their transportation system made me totally hate LA.  Above ground trams up all the major streets take you all over the city and beyond. Sigh. With a stroller, I wouldn’t be able to do it easily by myself, but it was so great. Everything is very walkable too. It reminded me of a European city, like London, but a lot less crowded and stuffy…and cleaner! It’s not very old, so it has a lot of modern architecture as well.

Melbourne CBD Map

The purple outline/rectangle is the CBD (we think Central Business District) and it’s pretty much where we were all week, with a few outliers. Our hotel was on Flinders and Elizabeth (approximately) Look at all those parks and gardens! Sigh.

After getting a couple of maps and grabbing dinner at an Indian place by the hotel we were exhausted and made it an early night!

Brit loves to snuggle up with his daddy and watch him play his computer game

Here he’s in his “art shirt” from a painting session and then had to watch “baby time” which he now signs.

When he gets his glazed look and juts out his chin, we know he’s in the zone. I’m really trying to only let him watch it a couple of times a day, but he gets so mad when he can’t watch “baby” anymore. At least he’s learning another language, right?