Eleven days ago I realised it was Wednesday and that I had no plans for the weekend. In fact, I realised that it would be my last long weekend before Easter (as it happens, that is no longer the case, but that’s another story) and decided that I should use it well.
I decided to go to Melbourne, that being a place that was fairly easily reached by coach. I found a 2-day tour of the Great Ocean Road that sounded like fun, contacted a few people on Couchsurfing and bought the coach tickets. Everything got sorted in a day.
On Thursday afternoon, after having been to the university for an O-week (Orientation week) meetup and after spending an hour more than planned packing, eating and sorting other stuff, I headed to North Wollongong Station and caught the train to Sydney. As always when one catches the last service that will get one to the connection on time, the train was late. The train which was supposed to arrive in Sydney just after 6 pm arrived at 6.25. I was supposed to check in for my 7pm coach at 6.30 and I flitted around Sydney Central Station nervously looking for the coach stop. Of course, it then transpired that I could check in with the driver (rather than at the office) and that didn’t start till 6.45.
Short version: I made my overnight coach.
I slept remarkably well on the full coach, waking up twice: at each half-hour meal stop, the first around midnight and the second around 3am. I got out, stretched my legs, read some of my Finnish e-book (Neidonpaula, by Kristiina Vuori), bought some overpriced muesli bars and even chatted to a few of my fellow passengers. We arrived in Melbourne just after 7 am on Friday morning and I was feeling refreshed but hungry.
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| Meal stop at 3 am. |
Having a smart phone with a data connection (something I didn’t have back home) allows for less organised travelling. I hadn’t planned breakfast and I didn’t even have a map of Melbourne. I was relying on Nokia Maps and good luck. So far I’ve found that there are a few features that are handy on a smart phone: maps, the ability to research my travel destination en route and the ability to check my lecture timetable and location info on the bus to uni. Though when it comes down to it, I also have offline maps on my tablet that would do the job and after week 2 I’ll know my timetable by heart. So that just leaves the ease of travelling speaking for smart phones. Once I’m not travelling… well, we’ll see if the smart phone just ends up gathering dust in a drawer.
I wandered in search of breakfast. A local saw me looking lost, staring at the map on my phone, wondering about strategy and asked if I was trying to find somewhere. “Breakfast,” I replied. She recommended a couple of streets with lots of cafés and I headed in the direction she pointed out. I ended up having a delicious breakfast of muesli with fruit, yogurt and honey, two slices of raisin toast and a café latte in Cafenatics. An excellent start for an excellent day.
It was too early for any museums to be open, so I walked down to Federation Square, over the bridge and towards the Botanic Gardens. Along the way I discovered the Queen Victoria Gardens, the King’s Domain (park) and the Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden. Typically, the memorial for women was designed by a man. Though the garden was constructed and planted in 1934, so maybe I’ll let it slide, just this once.
The Botanic Gardens were a haven and I could have spent the entire day there, but I wanted to see a few other things in Melbourne as well, so I settled for a slow amble through the Australian Forest Walk. I find it amazing that Australian forests have dwindled - for the sake of match sticks. Some of the slow-growing conifers of Australia were logged by Europeans for match sticks. How important.
Having purchased a Myki travel card from a 7-Eleven, I caught a tram back to Federation Square. There, I briefly explored the Ian Potter Centre of the National Gallery of Victoria - Aboriginal and modern Australian art. I don’t really understand art, but from a purely aesthetic point of view, it can be relaxing. After that I decided I needed to sit down, so I caught the free city loop tram and rode around Melbourne until I felt the need for lunch.
I grabbed some Indian dahl to go and ate it on the lawn of the Carlton Gardens. The night spent on a coach was catching up with me, so after eating I stretched out in the shade and dozed. I was woken by a phone call from the guys running the tour I was going on the next day (I would say “tour operator”, but that would seem really odd, considering the nature of the tour - that’ll be a topic for the next post). Feeling refreshed again, I headed to the nearby Melbourne Museum. I only had time for one exhibition (I was pretty thorough) and a respite in the museum’s rainforest. The exhibition was called First Peoples, all about the Aborigines of Australia. Some stories were happy, some were sad, a few made me angry.
After this I met up with my Couchsurfing host and we ambled around for a while. I spotted this great Star Wars mural and, of course, had to take a photo of it. With me holding my Aiki Wars mug. We had dinner at my host's favourite restaurant, an Indian place. That meant Indian food twice in one day for me, but I didn’t mind. I love Indian food. One of my host’s friends joined us, a chap who had just returned from India. We compared Finland and Australia, India and Cambridge, and talked about identity, politics, feminism and uni life. Afterwards, we walked down to the river and just sat talking some more.
I had couchsurfed twice before, in Gothenburg, and this third time did not let me down. In fact it was brilliant. We had a friendly game of table tennis before going to bed, I slept like a rock (though my host told me later that he’d been cold overnight and couldn’t sleep for fear of me being cold), and in the morning my host provided me with breakfast.
Thus I headed back to Federation Square to jump on a tour of the Great Ocean Road, with a surfing lesson waiting for me...
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