Australia 2010

Australia from Wackymango on Vimeo.

I’ve abandoned it and have returned to it.  It’s kinda like that toy you had as a kid: you play with it for a while, get tired of it, then when you find it after time passes, it becomes fun again.  But in reality, I didn’t get bored with it, I just didn’t know what to do with the material I had.

It took me two yeas and needless to say, its finally done. 

The links below are the previous posts on my trip to Australia.

http://wackymango.blogspot.com/2010/06/australia-day-2.html

http://wackymango.blogspot.com/2010/06/yarra-valley.html

http://wackymango.blogspot.com/2010/06/day-2-part-2-downtown-melbourne.html

http://wackymango.blogspot.com/2010/07/sydney-bound.html

Sydney Bound

Posted for July 1
With my flight leaving for Sydney at 7 pm, I've got my afternoon planned for another go around in the downtown area. I ran into Luke in the Hostel lobby in which he approched me and said, "first to pinch and punch on the first of the month." As he phycially pinched and punched me, I laughed outloud and thought to my self, "what the hell?"

Heading to downtown, my first mission is to look for an electronic store. I forgot to pack my charger for my video camera. As soon as I found one, I headed off to a beef pie shop that I saw the other day. Located in a little alley I enjoyed my beef and bacon pie with a long black coffee for breakfast.


After breakfast, I went to Brevile St. The area reminded me of Telegraph Street in Berkely mixed with a little bit of Haight Street in San Francisco. Lots of botique shops. There are tons of spots with an out door area to enjoy coffee and people watch. I stopped by a couple records stores to take a gander and saw a couple interesting records such as a A Tribe Called Quest's "Rare and unlreleased Instrumentals."


I headed back to St. Kilda at about 3pm to grab a quick bite at a fish and chips spot then to the Hostel where my shuttle took me to the airport - Sydney bound. BTW, the fish and chips was pretty damn good. The shop fries their food in a Healthier rice oil which gave the fish and chips a different flavor.

I arrived in Sydeny at about 8:30 and got to the hostel at about 10pm. As I settled in my room, I met my 2 other room mates from Spain - Jesika and Mikel. After a quick introduction and chat I headed for the streets for some food. I ate a spot called Pepper Rice and had a sizzling plate of rice topped with corn and beef on the side. I headed back to the hostel and crashed after my meal.

Day 2: Part 2 Downtown Melbourne

Posted for June 29
I walked the city area for about 5 hours finding my way to the Port area which is filled with restaraunts, a Shopping Mall, and thier AFL Stadium The main downtown area is similar to any other metropolitan down town area. Filled with people moving like ants -shopping, working, and hanging out.

As I walked though downtown I came accross an alley way with people doing Graffiti. I spoke to a guy who was supervising and got a little info. The city allocates funds to Graffiti projects. Specific area are maintained and assigned to the real graffiti artists. Melbourne defines can art in two differnt interpretations:



Graffiti (unaccepted by the government)- unorganized can works with no thought in to a piece - aka Tagging
Street Art (accepted by the government) - Pieces such as the one shown in the picture

After exploring the downtown area, I found a spot that served ramen. I ate and headed back to the hostel.

Yarra Valley

If you're looking for something to do, you can never go wrong with a Wine Tasting Tour. This will be my 3rd international wine tasting tour. Go figure, you'll probably get a little tipsy (or sh*t face if you're a light weight); and any time you you get a bunch of intoxicated people together, you'll meet people. That's exactly what happened. I ended meeting a couple folks from my hostel. They were both down to earth. They seemed like really good friends who've known each other for years, but it turns out, they met in Thailand earlier this year. The gentleman - Luke - is from the UK who's been traveling for 8 months now. He decided to quit his job and just go. The gal - Mal - is from Sydney who came down here to Melbourne to hang out.
The tour covered 4 wineries and a huge lunch at a botique winery. The wines that we went through were good. Not the best, but good enough. The region where Australia produces a higher quality of wine comes from another region - the Barrossa Valley which is located 8 hours from Melbourne and and hour away from Adelaine. The four wineries we visited were:

De Bortoli - Family owned and one of the largest exporters of wine in Australia
Train Trak - A botique winery that caters their wines to restaraunts
Yering Station - The oldest and first Winery in Victoria
Domaine Chandon - I thought they were only located in Napa

In my opinion, of the four, Domaine Chandon had the better wine. I purchased 2 bottles of their Shiraz which is only made in Australia. Accoring to the wine host at the winery, the Shiraz is not exported. I also found thier Rose to be quite tastey.
When i got back to the hostel, I had dinner with the 2 folks that i had met on the tour. We ate a place called Clay Pot. The food was good. We shared a mixture of tapas and 2 different clay pot dishes.


Tapas:
Sting ray, octopus, calamari, string beans, eggplant, portabello mushroom, and a tomatoe mixture.
Clay Pot dishes:
Morracan Clay pot - Seafood ebmeddded on top of seasoned cuscus topped with finely grounded mint.
Cajun - A gumbo seafood mixture layed ontop thick rice

The Morracan Clay pot was my favorite. After dinner we headed back to the hostel. I had a beer then called it a night.

Australia: Day 2

I went to bed early last night due to Jet lag, 17 hours ahead. I crashed at 8pm. I got up at 8 and headed to Down Town Melbourne. First stop: The Victorian Market.

It’s not as dope as the market in Barcelona, but it’s good enough. And at that, It’s probably the second best market that I’ve seen. It’s a Market that sells fresh Produce: Meat, Sea Food, Chicken, Fruit, Vegetables and clothes and souvenirs. Not having breakfast yet, I headed straight for the food section and had a pastry called Burek stuffed with meat. I expected beef, but it tasted like lamb. None the less, It was Freaking Good. Made fresh. After that I headed to the fish area. I walked around a bit and saw Australian oysters. The light bulb in my head lit up instantly. After seeing everything the market had to offer, I picked up 6 oysters, then headed to the meat area and picked up 3 dollars worth of Serrano Prosciutto from Spain. Then a bottle of Wine and bread. Instant Breakfast but not breakfast food. Freaking AWESOME!!!

With the weather being cold and light rain, I picked up a couple Japanese type bomber hats. Super warm and comfy.

After the market, I walked the city. The market is just 5 min away from the main down town area.

Let the Planning Begin!

I'm so happy and excited to say that I got my days off request from work approved. That means, I'm headed to Australia! How did this come about... easy. I've putting off Australia for the past couple years. I'll be attending a wedding in Hawaii, so I figured, the trip back home would be quicker. The tentative plan is as follows: SFO to Melbourne. Train or car rental from Melbourne to Sydney. Sydney to Honolulu. Planning to leave June 24 and return from Hawaii on the 11th.