2006 - MELBOURNE

MELBOURNE

FUNKY, RETRO, CULTURAL AND FINE DINING

I have been to Melbourne twice.  Once for a short trip in the late 70's. I worked for the Sydney Railways then and got free rail travel so Hubby and I hit Melbourne to meet my works buddies and have a look around.   2nd time I attended the first big Virtual Tourist meet in 2006.   So I have a few photos of that to share happy memories.

When you mention Melbourne, the first thing that comes to mind is 4 seasons in one day.   Yes Melbourne is renowned for that.  It can be cold, then rainy one minute, then sunny and warm the next.

But the thing that impressed me about Melbourne and others say the same thing is that it is a big cultural city, it's laid back and everyone is super friendly.   Melbourne is very arty, funky and dining, just awesome!

STREETS OF MELBOURNE

Melbourne is a walkable city with something interesting to see around every corner from the famous iconic Flinders Station Building to the fascinating Federation Square to the Art Centre to the markets and small alleyways.   It’s a fun city to wander around.

Then there's the trams and horse and carriage, yellow cabs everywhere,  although Uber has probably ruined the taxi business now like all other cities.

We went for a short walk along the Yarra river behind Federation Square and found it quite pleasant despite the fact that it is well known to be unclean with many promises by the Government to clean it up.   I hope they get their finger out and do this. 

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SHOPPING

Melbourne has one of the best markets I've been to.   I bought hubby a beautiful Marino wool jumper with nice soft blue, grey and apricot woven colours very reasonably priced.   I also bought daughter Kelli a t-shirt with an attitude which she loved.

In the Federation building I found a lovely glass shop and purchased the two shells pictured below.

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ST KILDA

St Kilda is a nice place to visit if you want to do a tram trip.   We enjoyed our wander through the quaint main street with it has variety of restaurants with sidewalk alfresco dining to the seaside with markets and famous Luna park.

Then back again for a lazy lunch.

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VT MEET

The first ever big Australian VT meet in 2006 saw around 40 of us including a couple from California and 2 ladies from New Zealand.   It was so cool to walk into the accommodation and see my friends, most of them I have never met before but we had known each other for many years on Virtual Tourist. That site doesn't exist anymore thanks to Trip Advisor buying VT and then axing it.   But what they didn't count on is that VT was such a close knit site of super friendly travel addicts who wouldn't even consider looking to join TA.   We all did the opposite, like join Travellerspoint.   So that was a good thing for TP.

Anyway, we spent a day at a winery and then went to hanging rock.   We had a fabulous dinner on the banks of the Yarra and I took some nights shot on my Fuji Finepix point and shoot that I love.

The NZ'ers couldn't find any sheep  😜

 

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