English version (part 1): Melbourne
Door: Franziska
Blijf op de hoogte en volg Franziska & Klaas
03 Januari 2015 | Nederland, Groningen
First of all we would like to wish you a VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR! Hopefully it will be a year full of joy, love, good health and happiness for all of you!
We are really sorry, you had to wait so long for this trip report. We’ve just been far too busy with Christmas preparations lately. We really hope though, that your patience will be worth the wait and that you will enjoy reading about the adventures we experienced during our recent trip to Australia. On the following pages we will do our best to entertain you with funny stories, interesting facts about our destination and useful travel tips. Hopefully our trip report will bring up lovely memories in those of you who had the chance to visit this fantastic country before and inspire others to consider Australia as a future travel destination. But whatever your reason for reading this is, have fun!
Sunday 26th and Monday 27th of October 2014: Flight from Amsterdam via Dubai to Melbourne
I can be brief about these first two days of our trip: it were two very long and rather boring days of travelling to Melbourne via Dubai. For us it was the first experience with Emirates and also the very first flight in an Airbus 380. The experience leaves us with mixed feelings. In terms of service Emirates does a better job than most of the European and American air carriers. Their staff is very international and speaks many different languages. They are extremely friendly too. The baggage allowance included in the price of your ticket is 30 kg per person in economy class and you can divide your luggage over as many pieces as you want to. Every passenger has its own on-demand entertainment system with a personal touch screen and the choice between hundreds of movies, tv-series, music tracks and games. Even their meals are quite edible and a lot of the beverages including wine are complimentary. So far so good! However we did find a few negative points too. First of all the Boeing 777 and the A380 we flew with are very big aircrafts and it takes almost an hour to get all the passengers on board. The size of the aircraft also slows down the service. Most of the time it took them more than an hour after take-off, before dinner was finally served. This wouldn’t be that bad, had they served us a drink first. But unfortunately Emirates prefers to serve the beverages after the food. Having a late night departure and a flight that was delayed by almost an hour, that meant by the time we finally got something to drink it was almost midnight. But they took us safely to our destination and in the end, this is all that counts.
Tuesday 28th of October 2014: Arrival in Melbourne
After two rather sleepless and tiring nights on the plane we finally reached our destination Melbourne in the early hours on Tuesday morning. Due to our former experience with the Australian immigration and quarantine authorities we expected the formalities to be quite time consuming and were preparing for a long wait. This time we were very pleasantly surprised though. There was no queue at immigration and the officer in charge didn’t ask us a single question, before he stamped our passports and let us pass. Picking up our luggage and passing through quarantine control was just as fast and before we realized it, we were standing in the arrival hall. Luckily our Australian friends Helen and David had made it to the airport just in time to pick us up.
We met them on our last trip to Australia five years ago on a campground up in Kakadu National Park (NT). We spent a lovely evening chatting to each other and it clicked so well between us, we stayed in contact ever since. On their recent trips to Europe in 2011 and 2013 they even came to visit us here in Groningen and stayed a few nights at our place. During these visits to Groningen they developed from complete strangers to very close friends and by now they actually feel like family to us. Therefore all four of us were excited to see each other again that morning. Although Helen and David live about a three hour drive north of Melbourne in Moama on the Murray River, they had come down to pick us up and spend a few days in the city with us. They brought us to Helen’s sister Sally in Richmond, who had kindly agreed to host the four of us at her place during our stay in Melbourne. After a quick shower and a bit of catching up over a cup of tea, we walked along the Yarra River to the Royal Botanic Gardens. Although the weather was cool and overcast at first with even a few short rain showers, it soon started to clear up. After a leisurely stroll through the gardens and a sandwich at a little café, we visit the Shrine of Remembrance. Except for being an impressive memorial to the soldiers killed in action during WW1, the Shrine offers wonderful views of the skyline of Melbourne. A short stroll along St. Kilda Road and over Princes Bridge brought us to the famous Flinders Street Station and Melbourne’s art precinct Federation Square. There is a huge contrast between the French Renaissance style building of Flinders Street Station completed in 1909 and the ultra-modern Fed Square complex officially opened in 2002. And although the strange, deconstructivist design of the Fed Square buildings are very controversial among Melbournians , they have most certainly become a landmark and an important tourist attraction for Melbourne. The buildings host several art museums, a theatre, restaurants, cafés, shops, tv-headquarters and even the tourist information. Unfortunately we only have time for one museum today and decide to visit the Aboriginal Art collection at the National Gallery. The visit to this part of the gallery is free and it is a good introduction into the different styles of Aboriginal art in Australia. As David is a collector of Aboriginal art and thus knows a good deal about it, he can show us around and explain certain details to us making our experience to this museum even more memorable. After a nice hot chocolate at one of the cafés and a quick visit to the tourist information for some brochures we take the free city circle tram, which takes us on a loop along some of the most important buildings of the CBD. Unfortunately by now the jet lag starts to hit and we hardly manage to keep our eyes open. So after completing the loop we decide to head back to Sally’s place in Richmond. But before we board the tram back, we make a quick stop at a Telstra shop to buy an Australian SIM-card for my mobile phone. This way it will be a lot easier and cheaper to stay in contact with Helen and David and make reservations and inquiries by phone. For the tram back to Richmond we use the MYKI-cards Sally had kindly borrowed us.
MYKI is a very similar system to London’s Oyster, Hongkong’s Octopus or even the Dutch ov-chip card. You charge the card with money and whenever you board or leave a tram, train or bus, you have to touch on and off and the appropriate fare is automatically deducted from the money on your card. Although very handy and very easy to use, MYKI isn’t very tourist-friendly. Certainly if you use public transport only once or twice, MYKI is pretty expensive, as on top of the ticket fare you have to pay a 6 AU$ non-refundable fee for the card. Unlike in the Netherlands, where you can still buy a simple paper ticket for trams and busses, in Victoria there is no alternative to MYKI. So if you don’t plan to make much use of public transport, you might as well inquire at your hotel, if they can borrow you a MYKI-card. Lots of accommodations currently offer this service to their customers. This way you only pay for the ticket fare, but not the 6 $ card fee.
Too tired to wait for a home cooked meal we decide to go out for dinner. At a nice little Vietnamese restaurant on Swan Street, Helen had discovered during one of her former visits to Melbourne, we enjoy a yummy noodle soup and a tasty chicken curry. Back at Sally’s place it is bed time for Klaas and myself.
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