Adventure, baby!

Month: August 2010

Birthday in Melbourne: Day 3

/ Sydney Food, Travel, Victoria / 3 Comments

My birthday fell on day 3 of our Melbourne trip. We had a sleep in, breakfast in the hotel, and then sauntered off to the Tim Burton Exhibition.  I’ve always admired his films, so seeing his artwork on loan from personal collections was quite amazing. I found it entertaining picturing him as an animator for Disney, seeing as his personal style is quite the opposite.

I felt most inspired seeing the exhibition, as Tim Burton has clearly worked extremely hard to get to where he is. For every success he has had, he’s had more than double the amount of projects go nowhere. His passion and skill have taken him to where he is, also his tenacity. It reminded me to be stronger and not give up on my dreams.

Hello giant blow-up scary person.

“Nananananananana BATMAN!”

My favourite quote of the day, overheard in the exhibition: “Did he do Shrek?” Lol.

After the exhibition we wandered around some more on the river banks until the sun went down.

The Yarra.

Very scenic.

As CBD as it gets.

Pretty bridge makes for nice photos.

Baroo?

It’s my birthday and I’ll pose if I want to.

And make my husband pose too!

Another graffiti wall.

Outside the ACMI building – such a cool design.

I lurve you blob!

Raaarrr!

We didn’t exactly see eye-to-eye, lol.

Run, husband!

Blobs make for handy seats too.

And then SHE said …

After much wandering, we had dinner at the very funky Fifteen. I love Jamie Oliver, so was keen to try his restaurant.

The restaurant was excellent. Stylish, great vibe, fabulous service. The food was really great, interesting recipes rather than the stock standard type, particularly for the veggo options.

What is down the stairs?!

Happy birthday to me! (This may have started out as “happy birrhday” …)

Another year older …

One more pose for the road. Happy, well-fed and slightly tipsy.

Even the restaurant had graffiti art …

I’m on a tram!

Back at the hotel – Alec and the frog, together at last.

I wore out my husband …

Thanks so much for the fantastic weekend away Alec 🙂 xox

31st Birthday in Melbourne: Day 2

/ Family, Travel, Victoria / 0 comment

Day 2 kicked off with brunch at Di Bella in north Melbourne with an old friend, Dana, and her bf Karl, an ex-intern at Google and who joined our netball team while she was in Sydney. Dana moved back to Melbourne after her internship ended and is moving to Seattle in the near-ish future to join Google there, where I’m sure she will take the Seattle netball team to new heights of victory.

I enjoyed the breakfast at Di Bella immensely, even more so because we were introduced to Dana and Karl’s brunch technique of ordering food, then eating cake while the breakfast was being cooked. Breakfast of champions. Amazing.

Pear and chocolate danish. Divine.

Netball yay 🙂

After brunch (and an unscheduled drive to the bus depo in Footscray to pick up the wallet Alec left on the airport bus – PS Sunshine street is NOT sunny people) Alec and I walked around Melbourne and ate more food.

I’d like a purse THIS big.

I love how Melbourne has random sculptures scattered around it. Like the giant purse. Or the men waiting for a tram.

Like CityRail in Sydney, trams can take a while to arrive. This poor fellow has been waiting a looooong time.

I practice my tram-waiting face while waiting for the tram, of course.

Melbourne also has a lot of graffiti art. I enjoyed the little alleys with oh-so-cool cafes, jam-packed with trendy Melbourne-ites, and covered with bright designs.

Even the dumpsters got the art treatment.

The husband loves a good alley.

The wife loves a good Tiffany store 😉

Lindt gets arty.

Birthday tulips! Thanks husband!

Melbourne Central shot tower in the middle of a shopping centre. So cool.

More graffiti.

Dinner at Pellegrini’s Espresso Bar for home-cooked, simple, Italian food. 

After dinner it was off to Mary Poppins at Her Majesty’s Theatre. Alec was fabulous and booked us great seats with a package that included wine and a goody bag (ooooh more gifts!).

“Feed the birds, tuppence a bag!”

The show was fantastic. I wasn’t sure what to expect, so it surpassed any expectations I might have had. I adored Mary Poppins the movie when I was growing up, so the musical brought back lovely memories. The singing, dancing and set were all fabulous.

31st Birthday in Melbourne: Day 1

/ Family, Travel, Victoria / 1 Comment

For my birthday this year, Alec took me to Melbourne. We were blessed with lovely weather. A full three days of sunshine, wheee! We stayed at The Olsen, a fabulous new hotel in South Yarra, decorated with the artwork of John Olsen.

I love this – I did take one home with me!

Stylish room with artwork by Olsen.

Morning light – hitting the shops.

We had a lazy Saturday morning before wandering down Chapel St to grab some brunch and shop. Fun for me, perhaps less fun for Alec.

Feed me!

Coffeeeeee!

It was then off to the Melbourne Museum to see Titanic: The Artefact Exhibition. 

Who knew Melbourne would be so sunny!

The exhibition was great. It contained a lot of artefacts that had been recovered from the wreck as well as telling many personal stories of people who survived and perished. It also had sobering facts about the sheer number of people who died.

“I’m the king of the world!”

Snack time at Koko Black.

Nom nom.

One more coffee for the road.

Heating from the inside out. Brr Melbourne is cold.

Tasty pudding.

Mousse martini. Looks amazing. Made me feel ill afterwards.

Walking through Melbourne in the fading light.
Tram!

Hip hop dancers in Federation Square.

Dinner – a local Thai joint.

Yay, we’re in Melbourne!

Dreams and Desires

/ Family / 2 Comments

I was going to title this post “My Bucket List”, but I think the concept is a bit morbid, so I prefer to call it what is really is – a list of things I dream and desire to do.

1. Visit the sloth sanctuary in Costa Rica.
2. Visit the Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania.
3. Publish a book of my photography.
4. Have my photography exhibited in a gallery.
5. Start a family with Alec.
6. Climb Machu Pichu.
7. Teach my daughter that I hope to have, to dance like no-one’s watching.
8. Touch people with my photographs.
9. Set up a small animal sanctuary and take in all the reject animals no-one else wants.
10. Learn to cook a decent risotto.
11. Start my own business.
12. Ogle penguins in Antartica.
13. See a polar bear in the wild.
14. Visit the Galapagos Islands and swim with seal lions, watch giant turtles.
15. Never stop dancing.
16. Find a stronger sense of inner calm.
17. Be braver and stronger. Take more risks.
18. Support animal charities and welfare groups.
19. Help support animal legislation to bring about real change.
20. Renew my wedding vows on a Kauai’an Beach.
21. Stay young at heart.

I’m sure there are more, which I will post about later when I think of them.

Bye Bye J-Vo

/ friends, Sydney Life / 0 comment

My dear friend JennJenn is heading off the the Mexico office soon. I’m not really great at telling people how I feel in person, or even showing it through writing. This seems to be surprising to a lot of people as they think of me as a writer, ergo, I must be good at every kind of writing. Also, I’m a prodigious talker, ego, I must be ace at expressing myself verbally. Ba-bow. It doesn’t work that way. Turns out, I’m much better at showing how I feel through photographs.

So for my very dear friend’s farewell, I put together a book chronicling her time at the office over the four-and-a-half years she graced us with her huge presence. In the words of a much better wordsmith than myself, Jenn is the biggest, little person I know.

My friend, I am going to miss you a lot.

I promise we will be visiting you soon. Love you lots.