The afternoon after my last blog was pretty much as I described it. A cruise on the Yarra river which was nice but not that exciting followed by a quick bite to eat on the river banks (where I was surrounded by about 1 million birds who quite clearly all wanted some of my roasted vegetable ciabatta - it was really quite freaky as they were all sat at eye level, just watching me eat, waiting to swoop in for any left overs - creepy).
Rather than go up Rialto towers like I had done earlier in the week I decided to go up the newere Skytower which is an observation deck higher up than Rialto with the added bonus of 'The Edge' which is a box which sticks out of the side of the building which is made from glass so you go in it and look down and can see the ground with nothing else in the way.
I was well dubious about going on it as I really don't like piers due to the fact that you can see the sea through the cracks but I eventually convinced myself that I would never get the chance again and I'd regret it forever if I didn't go for it. It's quite reasurring that you get to step in to the box when all of the glass is frosted up and then they slowly move you out to the point where after some not veey reasuring cracking noises, the glass clears to show you that you are 300 meters up (88 stories) with only a sheet of glass between you and the ground - aaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh.
The lady operating the box was hilarious as she advised me that the best view was to lie face down on the GLASS FLOOR. I have never moved so slowly and carefully in my life (in case I broke the 1 1/2 foot thick glass of course). It was a great view but made me feel really quite sick so I'm not sure I'd ever do it again!!
Met a lady called Meryem when I came out of the Edge who had a photo of me on all 4's in the box (working my way down to lying!!) and we went for a coffee to discuss how cool it was up there and quickly became good freinds bonding about how rubbish blokes can be (sorry guys!!).
After that I headed back for an early night as I had to get up for 7am the next day for the great ocean rd tour. unfortunately, the next day was the drearyest, rainy day I've seen in Melbourne - gutted. I hadn't even looked out of the window before getting dressed and had on full on summer gear - needless to say, I had to purchase a warm hooded top for $69 at the 1st available opportunity.
We stopped at loads of cool places on the way to the 12 apostles and had an amazing guide who was like a young Rolf Harris (beard, big curly hair, very excitable about facts- youu know what I mean!!). He kept us all entertained for the 16 hour adventure (I think it is meant to take about 14 hours but he was gassing so much he added 2 hours to the trip). Luckily it brightened up by the time we reached the 12 apostles and I got some ace photo's on the helicopter ride there.
The next day I went to St Kilda with Meryem where we hung out at the beach and went to see the grand prix track which they are currently building for the race in March. It was quite cool to see it but it does mean that I will have to watch the actual grand prix now just to say I have walked on the track. At 5pm we went on the Neighbours tour and were lucky enough to get K/Carl Kennedy as the actor which was good for 2 reasons 1) he is fit for an old guy and 2) I actually recognised him, unlike 90% of the rest of the 2008 cast.
After the neighbours tour we got changed and went for a night at the casino where we played some pokies (the aussie's hillarious and very rude name for slot machines!!) and roulette (where I DID NOT win on 28 even though I always do - what is that about!!). Went up the the casino nightclubs after that and had a good old boogie whilst chatting to random Aussie's (One of whom was trying to show us what he called, the 'australian national dance' called the rudie dance - you can imagine what it looked like - I kindly informed him for the sake of all women in the world that there was no way that he would EVER pull doing that dance - you can thank me later ladies!).
The next afternoon was my flight to Sydney where I politely got told when I was checking in that I was at the wrong airport and would need to get a taxi across Melbourne to Avalon airport which was a mere hour away and cost a small fortune at $104 - whoops - at least it's only money.
Met Lynds from Work on Friday night and we headed back to her and Geth's flat where they have the most amazing view of the harbour bridge from their living room. We went to 'the biggest pub in the world' (as named by Lynds and Gethin) and bought meat from the butcher in the pub!!! which we cooked ourselves on the barbie outside - how's that for a real Aussie experience.
The next day was gorgeous weather so we got up and headed to Palm beach which is where they film home and away. We stopped off at 'the best pub in he world for lunch (Gethin again - due to the fact that 1 side there is a view of the sea and the other, a view of the big sports screen playing the 6 nations rugby!!!) as Lynds' mate John was driving so we could take our time getting to the beach.
Palm beach was cool, the surf club actually has A. Stewart as the proprietor. Geth took me out to the sea to find a good spot for boogie boarding but the current and the waves were so strong that I could hardly stand up and kept losing my bikini bottoms so probably not the best idea to boogie board for the 1st time with winds that strong.
After we came back from palm beach we got changed and headed in to Sydney where we saw the Queen Victoria which is on it's maiden voyage - It is massive. Met up with Meryem as she was in Sydney for a couple of nights and went to a few bars at the rocks which is near the harbour bridge beore heading down to darling harbour for soe more classy bar action. Unfortunately, we finished the night off with a trip the the PBH which is a sports bar that was playing the Welsh 6 nations match at 1am. It was a really good night though.
Sunday we were a bit to hung overe to venture out before lunch time but when we did make it out, me and Lynds headed down to the Quay to get a boat to Watsons bay which is where the Ocean meets sydney harbour so it has a really cool lookout point accross the sea. Along the coastal walk there is also a nudist beach where there were loads of really old wrinkly men with their todgers out - GROSS. Apparently, Kathryn Hurst stood for ages at the look out point zooming in and taking photo's of the todgers when Lynds and Geth took her there (shame on you Hursty!!) but it was too gross to stay for long so I only got a couple of shots - I refuse to put them on here though!!!!!
We had a really cool day and on the way back on he ferry managed to catch the queen Victoria sailing out of the harbour and the QE2 sailing in which apparently is really rare and it was a huge deal with loads of TV camera's on helecopters and 1000's of boats in the harbour catching the action. All of the banks of the harbour were jam packed with people so we had a great seat on the river boat!
Today Lynds and Geth were back at work (booooo - for them and for me!) so I went to the botanical gardens for a bit of a wander and went up to Mrs Macquaries point from which you can get amazing photo's of the bridge and he opera house. After that I was booked in to the bridge climb at 2.15 with Becky and Claire whic I met in Melbourne. The climb was really good - although 1 looked like MC Hammer in my grey all in 1 jump suit that are 1 size fits all. We had a brilliant laugh on the climb and flirted with out instructor who was gorgeous for the full 3 hours - I think he may have been glad to get rid of us.
We went for a few drinks after the climb and met a guy called Chris in the pub who was from New Zealand and was 6'8, check out the photo of me and Becky (who is also 5'1) with him - If I can figure out how to load them up on Lyndsey and Geth's computer!!
That's about it for now as its now monday night and I am off to bed - hopefully at least some of you will have made it this far - sorry my blogs are so super long but you know me, why say someting in 1 word when you can say it in 2 sentences!!!
Catch ya later!!
Jo
xxx
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