Melbourne - Garden, Treasury, Organ concert, casino

Hi there,

You are probably getting sick of reading more about Melbourne but it has so much to offer. And I am kind of stuck here if you will because my friends from Melbourne who live in Bremen now are here to visit their family and friends. I will meet them this weekend. So although I have already decided to not look any more for a job in Melbourne I will stay here until after this weekend and then travel on further. Therefore I am going to make the best of my time here and discover this city which was voted several times as one of the most liveable cities in the world. You have everything: business, art, culture, sport, science, tourism, lots and lots of events in a fabulous laidback and still kind of European atmosphere.

Anyway, on Wednesday I checked out of my well-known Nomads All Nations hostel as for some reason it was nearly booked out for the weekend. I left my suitcase in the luggage storage and headed to FitzroyGardens. Due to the delay of the city circle I was 10 minutes to late for the FREE garden walk. So I wandered around myself in this beautiful weather.

 

 It was lunchtime and apparently a lot of office workers spent their break here. This is really nice I think. After that I went inside the old Treasury Building (FREE entry!) to read some interesting facts about Victoria, Melbourne, Ned Kelly, the stories behind some street names and of course about gold.

 

 By 3pm I got my suitcase and walked 10 minutes to the new hostel, the Urban Central Accommodation. The building is newer, the staff more professional and the kitchen and all facilities much cleaner than the Nomads and you get a FREE towel and FREE daily breakfast. Great! At 5pm I met with Isa, a Philippine girl who arrived in the room at Nomads on Tuesday. We headed off to the Queen Victoria Night Market, talked a lot along the way and had dinner at the market (nothing special this time). At 6:30pm she stayed at the market while I walked quickly to the Town Hall for a FREE organ concert. It was an Aborigine concert with the title “We still live on” with didgeridoos, a performance dancer and the songs were all about the history, the present and the future of the Aborigines.

It was a good concert, I liked it. Lots of variety and different styles, a choir, different singers and instruments. After 1.5 hours I headed out into the still very warm evening and walked along the river where I decided to go into the casino again to take some pictures. It’s a big complex and I find it funny that they display warning signs like “Set yourself a limit and do not exceed it”, “Do not chase your losses. Walk away!” or “In the end the machines will win”.

 

 Back in the hostel I read some information about the West Coast as the idea of going there has somehow stuck in my head and I might really do it in the end! Before I left Germany I was certain to not bother about the West Coast as it would be too hard for me to travel there on my own but with a tour it might be possible. Also it seemed to not offer a lot to see except coastline and outback but there are quite a few things to discover. And it is still left very natural as mass tourism has not yet reached the West Coast. I have met some people who have done it and survived, so I could do it as well. Hmm… Let’s see how the next weeks will go.

On Thursday I did nothing spectacular. I went to Federation Square for the FREE Wifi, did some shopping at the Spencer Outlet Center and Myers, well and that’s about it really. Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day :-( It will probably be a bit hard to ignore it and it’s going to be hard to spend that day without my boyfriend. Ohhh, I am really not looking forward to tomorrow!

Yours days-in-Melbourne-passing Stefanie