Melbourne and The Great Ocean Road

For the first of our two consecutive Monday holidays, a few of my friend's and I were trying to plan a trip. And, since the first day of classes, a Tuesday, would have a Monday timetable, most of us weren't going to have class until Wednesday. Put it all together and you have a 5 day weekend in the middle of the semester.

Originally, we were thinking of camping at Fraser Island, since that was once place that we were all told to visit before we left Australia. But we soon realized that since it was a public holiday and some people had already been there, that we should go somewhere else. Conveniently, the other masses of French people had planned a trip to Melbourne and The Great Ocean Road for this weekend about 1.5 months ago. So, the previous weekend, we made a few phone calls and decided to go along with them. And, due to a mix-up in ordering the plane tickets, there was an additional ticket available. We found some one to take the ticket - another Frenchman - bringing the group total to 17.

We arrived intermittently to Melbourne as the weekend started. Some came on Thursday night and slept in the airport, I came by myself on Friday night, and the rest of the group showed up Saturday morning at around 2:30am. I didn't mind flying by myself and the Aussie girls sitting next to me were nice enough to sing Happy Birthday at midnight when we were sitting on the tarmac. Once I had gotten my bags and got in a long line to bus a bus ticket to the city, I asked the people behind me if they wanted to catch a cab instead. They, Guillame and Benedicte, agreed. Oddly enough, they were also French and working in Brisbane. When I got to my hostel, my friends were out and I couldn't get a hold of them, so I just walked around until going to sleep.

The next day was my birthday and the hostel that we stayed at had a pretty good internet connection and webcams on their computers, so I had a Skype conversation with Mom, Dad, Mark, and Nate back home - my first encounter with Milwaukee for the weekend. The rest of the day was spent walking around and soaking in the sights of Melbourne. We quickly realized that there were tons of things for us to do and see, so we did our best to hit some of the highlights. It helped that we broke up into small groups and picked a meeting place for lunch, but we still needed 2 or 3 days more before we could see everything that was on our list. So we saw some old Parliament buildings, gardens, shops, and other old houses and then met up to eat Sushi for lunch at Federation Square. From there, we walked to the Botanical Gardens and ANZAC Memorial. It wasn't a very long walk, but I was wearing the new shoes that I had purchased from the Queen Victoria Market that morning and they were giving me horrible blisters, so I went shoeless for the rest of the day.

The Botanical Gardens were really nice, but everyone was falling asleep except myself and a few others for an assortment of reasons. Since I wanted to see more of the gardens and I also had planned to see one of Nate's old teammates, Shae McNamara, play at Victoria park in his VFL game, I left the big group and did my own thing.

I basically ran through the gardens and across town, asking for directions along the way, to get the nearest train station. I had planned to see the last hour of Shae's game since his girlfriend told me that they usually last for about 2.5 hours when I called his phone. By the time I got to the train, I was glad to see that I would make it with about half an hour left to play. I got the train that I needed and then absentmindedly got off at the stop after Victoria Park. So I walked around to the other platform and waited 10 minutes for the return train. The train came, as scheduled, and took me all the way back to the station that I just came from. Why? Well, it was an express train and skipped the stopped that I needed plus a few more. So I walked around to the opposite platform again and waited for the train to take me to Victoria Park. This time, I got off where I needed to and ran to the park to find the crowds shuffling out of the exits. I just missed it.

So, I met up with Shae's girlfriend Kari, another Milwaukee native, and waited in the clubhouse until the team came out of the locker room. Now, Kari is a really nice girl, but the following 30 or 40 minutes that transpired are relatively indescribable. Some words that come to mind are hilarious, depressing, illuminating, and tolerable. The story goes something like this. Shae plays for the Collingwood Magpies. Collingwood is impoverished suburb of Melbourne, and for whatever reason, it's residents are extremely diehard fans of the Magpies. So they formed a fanclub of sorts called "The Magpies Club". This club consists of local residents and relatives of the players who, after each game, sit outside the locker room discussing famous footy players from the past and highlight's from the days game. Unfortunately for Kari, the people are mostly over the age of 50, only talk about the Magpies, and want to get to know her better as Shae's girlfriend. Luckily for me, I only had to go to that event once and they had free food. I don't know what they put in those meatpies and sausage rolls, but they taste delicious. So while we had our ears chewed off about the Magpies glory days and how so-and-so's famous friend that did something in America, one of Shae's teammates noticed our distress and pulled us away. I often wonder how long we might have been subjected to that if he didn't rescue. From there, I went back to Shae's apartment, told him about my trip and some of the places that I had been to. Then he drove me back to the hostel. It was good to have that Milwaukee connection on the other side of the world.

The next day, we started out on the Great Ocean Road - all 17 of us, in 4 cars. The Great Ocean is a road that hugs the shoreline from Melbourne to Adelaide. There isn't much to say about this trip because we were either sitting in the car or stopping to take pictures. I think the facebook album link at the bottom should work for people that want to see what the trip was about.

Basically, we left Melbourne, stopped in Torquay for lunch, stopped at a two beaches and a lighthouse along the way, and made it to The 12 Apostles by sundown. Then we backtracked to Apollo Bay where we met up with the others at cabin looked like it would better suited in northern Wisconsin. We had communal dinner and breakfast the next day and then headed out again. This time, we took a detour to see wild Koalas and Kangaroos, before heading back the Gibson Steps, and the 12 Apostles for a second time. We continued along to the road to Loch Ard Gorge, Port Campbell for lunch, London Bridge, and then Bay of Islands. Then we backtracked along the GOR for a bit and took a detour through the inland to catch a glimpse of Triplett falls before the last ounce of sunlight had vanished. After that, it was a nice 4 hour drive back to Melbourne. In the morning, we checked out, drove to the airport in the rental car, and caught our 8:30am flight.

The Great Ocean Road: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2709875&id=8645910&l=7518438acd