Day 2: Melbourne Mosey

For the sake of convenience we’re saying that Day 2 starts when we landed at Melbourne.  We plodded through customs slowly but surely, without any problems, and caught the skybus into town.  The bus dropped us off at the Southern Cross railway station which was pretty cool.  From here we took the subway to our first hotel The Claremont Guest House out in the “suburb” of South Yarra.  It seems that in this part of the world they call the different neighborhoods suburbs.  I haven’t quite figured out where Melbourne proper ends and the American type suburbs begin. 

That’s the other thing, so far Melbourne seems to have a lot more in common with Toronto than London.  If it weren’t for the palm trees, the left hand driving, and the accents I would have thought I took a very long flight to Ontario.  Not that we’re complaining, we love Ontario.  It’s just that there has been no culture shock at all.  We’re quite at home here. . . except the left hand driving.

Anyhow, the hotel is quaint.  It’s very old and hostel-ey and the room is tiny with a hardwood floor, a bed and very little else.  The bathrooms are communal and we have to turn in the key when we leave.  But they serve breakfast and the location is pretty great.  The neighborhood seems pretty fun and the trains and trolleys, which they call trams, stop right outside.

We spent the afternoon wandering around the downtown area.  We had lunch at an Asian place called Krakatoa which was pretty good and had dinner at another Asian place called Chocolate Buddha which was even better.  It was situated in Federation Square which was a really cool urban space set right on the Yarra River bank.  We also saw a lot of other sights downtown such as St. Patrick’s Cathedral and the Melbourne Museum but did not get to go inside them due to closures or crowds.  We did have fun walking through the Victorian shopping arcades that criss-cross the downtown streets.  Some of them were very ornate and beautiful.

So far we really like Melbourne and are looking forward to the next day but for now we are back at the hotel ready to call it a night.

Pictures to follow tomorrow, we're too tired to do any more uploading!