Melbourne

We passed through customs at Melbourne International with no problems after thinking that we would be stopped for carrying a Boots store of medication.

I think we must be unlucky when getting taxi drivers because the one that tried to take us to our hotel in Melbourne did not know where it was. I knew roughly where it was but the final 100 metres proved just too difficult so after suggesting he called his office for the address we found out that it was within 150 metres from where we were parked.
The hotel room was very nice and in an ideal location but unfortunately we had to change hotels the following morning after getting only a couple of hours sleep. The room, although not close to the old dilapidated lift, was very noisy, every time someone used the lift there was loud banging and whirring noises and with people returning to the hotel until 5AM, sleep was not possible. The second hotel was much better.

There is a free tram that follows a city loop and we took that to get our bearings within the city and then visited all the sightseeing spots. The MCG or Melbourne Cricket Ground was just at the side of the Yarra River and was to be the ground for the 2nd test between Australia and South Africa, as I write this entry for the Blog the Australians have just lost that match and the series. No laughing you Poms. The Rod Laver Stadium is next door and is the venue for the Australian Open tennis starting on the 19th January. Everyone is fitness mad here, either running, rowing or cycling even in temperatures which reached 34 degrees with pretty high humidity.

The Docklands area has a small ‘London Eye’ which is modelled on the same and while we were there the restaurants were holding lots of office Xmas parties.
The Eureka Tower is 92 floors high but also has a viewing deck on the 88th. Its unique feature is a platform called the Edge, which has a glass bottom and projects out from the side of the building. We didn’t bother with that because as you can see from the photo it was a long way down and Sheila was already feeling a little giddy.

We spent an excellent Christmas day with Alan and Joyce Hough whose wedding we attended back in 1969. We will be forever grateful to them, their family and friends for their kind hospitality for the five days over the Christmas period and it made a great change to stay with someone we knew.