Australia 7

Australia 7 Melbourne, Arrival of Ross, Birthdays and Oktoberfest (x2).

Friday 4th I got up at stupid o’clock and headed off to the Airport very excited and very very tired. As a 5am treat at the airport, I bought myself a hot slice of banana bread and waited for my flight. Managed to dose uncomfortably on the hour flight to Melbourne and was very happy to see Rosemary waiting for me at the arrivals lounge.

We drove into the outskirts of Melbourne where we found somewhere to park and then got a tram into the Central Business District. Rosemary had the amazing Idea to take me to the Lindt Café for breakfast. We had coffee and the most amazing cakes, one with chocolate orange and the other with a raspberry white chocolate concoction. Was AMAZING. Feeling pretty stuffed we walked around the city, visited the most amazing toilet with a view all over the city and walked though the park and the botanic garden. We explored the commonwealth square with a crazy glass building and a nice glass gallery inside and then walked along the river to an art instillation of balls, which were chiming their heads off.

After walking all the way down to the Anzac Memorial we decided that we had totally exhausted ourselves so jumped on a tram back into the CBD and got a sushi roll for lunch. It was getting pretty chilly by now so we hopped back on a tram to where we left the car dreaming of warm tea and a sit down.

Got back to the house and met Peter and Jonti the gorgeous golden retriever who I instantly fell in love with. Rosemary and I sat and chatted about family and Peter made us an amazing Fish Curry for dinner. We went on a post dinner possum hunt and saw about 6 or 7 possums up in the trees. Very weird little creatures! Rosemary and I sat up late chatting about hundreds of things and eventually went to bed for a long awaited sleep!


Saturday we went up to where some of the bad bush fires were last year in the Dandenog hills and went to a market there. Was really nice as it was under all the trees. We bought some Greek pumpkin and cheese bread stuff and drove up to a café viewpoint to eat lunch. We went for a walk around and saw two Kookaburras. Also saw this cat flap thing in the fence, which is meant for wombats to get through!

We then went to a post private school, which had an art show on. We thought it was going to be work of the students but it turned out to be a professional show. There was a lot of stuff that amusingly looked like it could have been done by the students but some of it was really interesting and both Rosemary and I found some things we really liked.

We got back and had an hour to chill out before Liz came round. The plan had been a bit confused as Rob had whooping cough and Liz didn’t know if she should leave him, but she decided he could fend for himself and Liz and I drove up to their Beach house. Its right out of Melbourne and you can walk to the beach from the house. We got there just as it was getting dark and Liz and I managed to light the fire, which Liz was very proud of for some reason. We drove back to the little town and got a fisherman’s pizza, which was delicious if a bit salty. We had to drink and entire bottle of white wine as we were thirsty from the pizza and we sat by the fire and chatted for ages. We also went on a mini possum hunt in the garden but as we got outside with the torches there was a seriously loud thud on the tin roof and Liz screamed and ran inside leaving me to face the elephant sized possum . . . so I ran inside too. Very funny.

Sunday morning we both woke up quite late and got up and pottered about and had a lazy breakfast. It was pretty chilly so we got the fire going again and headed for a walk to the back beach. It’s a gorgeous sandy back with big red rocks everywhere and massive sand dunes behind it. We were messing about taking self timed photos and managed to soak our feel in a big wave that came in unexpectedly. Resulted in a fairly amusing picture at least!

We managed not to get too lost walking back through the sand dunes and dried out shoes and socks by the fire while drinking Liz’s hippy jasmine tea. We decided to pop to the local town again after tea and walked round all the little jewellery shops and lots of amazing glass galleries. We had a coffee and a lemon cheesecake looking out to the sea.

Back to the house for a late lunch of pumpkin soup and bread that we had brought in town. We tidied up the place a bit and packed everything up then drove back to Melbourne. It was father’s day that Sunday so we went out for dinner with Rob, Erin and Stuart. Erin’s Fiancé (Vince) came as well and we had a really nice dinner. Was lovely to see Erin and Stuart again and Rob managed not to cough too much while eating his dinner. After dinner Liz drove me back to Rosemary’s and we said goodbye till December.

Rosemary and I sat up drinking tea and then both went to bed when I couldn’t cuddle Jonti anymore.

On Monday morning I packed up all my things and Rosemary showed me all her scrap booking stuff over breakfast. Her work is really beautiful and it gave me lots of Ideas of things to make. After Breakfast we drove back into Melbourne City centre and went to the Eureka tower, which is the tallest building in Melbourne. It has amazing 360-degree views and made Rosemary and I both feel a bit giddy. We went on the “EDGE” which is a mechanised box that moves you out so that you are just standing on glass and you can see all the way down to the ground. It’s meant tot be scary but we weren’t hugely impressed. Takes more to please two Cowell women apparently!

We headed back down to earth again and drove towards the airport, stopping along the way for a quick lunch to avoid horrible airport food.

We said goodbye and I went and caught my flight back to Sydney, pretty sad to be leaving.

On Tuesday I had my Glass review from Project 1 and it went really well and my tutor seemed really happy with what I was doing. I went to meet Annika in the evening at the main uni, and went to a thing called dorkbot, which was put on by the verge art festival. Was basically a lot of geeky people making robots but was pretty cool. I started feeling really ill though so I popped home rapidly and tried to sleep it off.

Still felt crappy in the morning so skived kayaking and talked to Ross on Skype feeling very sorry for myself. I managed to get up at lunch and go into my review with Michael for Sculpture. I thought he was going to tell me that I hadn’t done enough work but he was thrilled with what I had been making! He gave me an amazing report as well, which was cool! Had ceramics in the evening and then met Nina for dinner at the Lansdowne.

On Thursday I went shopping for Ross’s Birthday present and did some extra work in Ceramics.

Did lots of pre-Ross organization on Friday making a welcome to Oz banner and tidied my room up for the invasion. I brought him lots of different Australian beers to taste as well. In the afternoon I went to see Nina and read over one of her papers for her then we popped to the Hostel in the evening and had pizza and Beer with the boys and the Germans. Then went out clubbing and I had an early night as my stomach was still doing funny summersaults. Think I must have eaten something dodgy again…

Saturday was the canoe club trip to Cockatoo Island. We met at ten at the boat shed and paddled round the point of Balmain to the ex shipbuilding Island which has recently been done up again and made into a bit of a tourist attraction. It was a boiling day; about 28 degrees and I considered throwing myself in the slightly dubious harbour water more than once!

We had lunch on the island and explored around all the old industrial barns. The paddle back was also boiling and by the time we got back I was in serious need of a cup of tea so I headed up the road to Nina’s house and drank Coffee with her.

Sunday was the festival of the wind at Bondi beach and I had arranged to meet Nina and Alexa so we could go together. There were massive amounts of people all pouring into Bondi so getting there in the now 30-degree heat was pretty sweaty!!! The beach was a bit cooler due to the very welcome sea breeze and the kites were amazing. Was really really beautiful seeing so many Kits in the air at the same time.

Tyler came to join us and we all went for a very very cold swim!
Had a long sunbathe trying not to get too brunt and then Nina and I got the bus and train back into Sydney. I got the bus home and had a shower and did a final tidy before going to pick Ross up from the Airport.

I sat in the arrivals for about an hour after rushing trying to get there on time and when Ross finally came out I was stupidly excited to see him. We got the train and bus back to mine and I fed Ross and put him to bed, as he was totally dead from his stupidly long journey.

Monday I woke up very excited that Ross was here and that it was my birthday and after opening all my cards and prezzies we went out for breakfast at a café on Darling Street. We went to Glebe at lunch and had lunch with Alexa, Tyler and Nina. Ross was flagging seriously so I took him home after lunch and let him have a pre dinner nap.

In the evening we went out for a drink and then went to a really nice Thai restaurant in Balmain. I apparently got a bit drunk on my half of the bottle of wine, but managed to get us both home in one piece.

Tuesday was Ross’s Birthday and we caught the ferry into town and went shopping for Ross’ long awaited sunglasses that him parents had given him money for. We had a pizza lunch and had absolutely no success with the sunglass shopping at all. I had forgotten what a difficult fussy arse Ross can be! We had to give up as I had my Glass class to go to in the afternoon. Ross slept as he was still suffering the jetlag, and when I got back from Glass we went to darling harbour for dinner at hurricanes. Magically there was a sunglass shop still open next to the restaurant and we managed to get Ross some sunnies!!! YAY!!!!!

Wednesday Ross sent me off to Uni with a packed lunch and Ross got going on some of his “lists”. We went supermarket shopping in the evening and had gnocchi for dinner and another bottle of wine just for luck.

Thursday we got the ferry to manly and had a long sunbath and swim. It was a really nice day and we walled round to cabbage tree bag and shell beach and saw some gigantic lizards of the path. Ross seemed to be enjoying his new sunglasses! We caught the ferry home as the sun started to go down and then had dinner and watched a very odd DVD in the flat.

Friday Ross sent me off to uni again and caught up on his massive list of emails. In the evening we went to Christine’s 30th Birthday in Balmain and Ross made friends with a guy called Pete and we drunk lots of beer and tried not to be too scared of the Goth themed dress up that Christine had chosen!

Saturday we went o Manly again but this time with Nina. We rented a surfboard and Ross had his first attempt at standing up, which didn’t go very well, but was very amusing to watch! We had got Ross some flip-flops and had dinner in a $10 steak place.
After getting home and having a shower we headed back into town for a night of Oktoberfest drinking with the Germans and the hostel people. We sampled lots of German beers and ate a good few Pretzels between us.

That night Ross had had a really bad allergic reaction to something, which turned out to be the spray in conditioner I had put in my hair. I was up most of the night sneezing and not being able to breath, so I had had to have a shower at 4am to get the stuff out of my hair.
Ross was till really snotty on Sunday so we had it as a well-earned day of recovery. Ross and I did hardly anything in the morning and wandered around Rozelle market in the afternoon.

Monday was a normal day in uni, and Ross got stuff done in the flat, and Tuesday I went into Ceramics in the morning and did lots of Ceramics and had a swim. Ross came to Glass in the evening and watched me totally destroy the piece I had just made. I blame him for watching, as it obviously was too much pressure! It was chucking it down with rain as we walked back from Uni so we decided to run down the road and go for dinner in the Vegi restaurant at the bottom on my road. We got soaked just running down the road, but dinner totally made up for it, as did the crème caramel for pudding. Yum.

Wednesday morning I woke up to a very strange Orange light pouring through the window. Felt like we were on Mars or something. I took some photos of the dust storm then sat on the sofa and watched the news all about it. Was amazing to see it and I only wished that I had woken up a bit earlier so that I could have seen it when it was even redder! The really crazy weather from the night before had turned into super strong winds. These winds had stirred up all the dust in broken hill and dumped it on Sydney.

I went to uni as the dust was settling and had a good day in Crits looking at people work. In the evening I took Ross to Ceramics and watched him try and make a pot, which was funny. W met Nina for dinner at the Lansdowne afterwards and she showed us the pictures she had taken of us at manly on Saturday with her proper film camera.

Thursday we decided we needed to do something fun so Ross and I got the bus into town and went shopping. We spend ages looking at opals and feeding Ross who has got an appetite like an 18year old for no apparent reason. After lunch we went to the Aquarium and saw Dugongs and sharks and hundred of fish and some crazy crabs and a platypus! We got dinner on Darling harbour and when we got home watched 17 again. Was a really nice day ☺

On Friday I went to do some extra work in Ceramics and met Nina to pick which photos she was going to print out big for me. I went for swim and then made Fish pie in the evening for dinner. We went out after dinner for Oktoberfest take 2. Nina had decided that Oktoberfest take one wasn’t good enough. We went to the Bavarian beer café in the rocks and Ross had 2 litres of very very strong beer. We ended up going to Scubar, which is a little club near central station, and had a bit of a dance before going home.

Yesterday (Saturday) we went to Glebe market and I finally found a pair of ladybird earrings like the ones I lost from Italy! I was a very happy bunny so took Ross for a steak lunch at the Lansdowne. We met Alexa after lunch and had another wander round the market and finally got me a grown up wallet with out resin stains all over it then went for milkshakes.

Ross and I walked home and he made stir-fry for dinner and we watched a very off film about Barcelona.

Today is super windy and we are going to try and plan out trip for next week. We are going to try and hire a car but have just realised that we don’t have a credit card so it might be a bit tricky!!

Sorry this was such a long email. I need to try and keep up to date or I will forget what I did! That was a bit of a jigsaw puzzle!

Love you all lots.
Missing you all tonnes too. xxxxxxxxx