First time down under - Howdy mate
Finally it was time for me to go Down Under. Should have done it years ago already with so many relatives living there.
The trip was made during September 2008 and was all jobrelated. After a long flight from Amsterdam via Kuala Lumpur, I arrived late on a friday night in Melbourne. My intention to stay awake the 2nd part of the flight did not work out.. :( The sleep was nice, but now I was very awake when I entered my hotel room around 23:30hr.
Trying to plug in my laptop to send a message home I noticed that none of my travel adaptors was suitable here. Luckily there was a nightshop across the street where I could buy one. So, the feeling of being really far away all changed to an exited relief of being able to have contact again!
My hotel by the way was "The Grand" which is housed in an old railway-office-building located at Spencer Street.
So, still awake at night, I first did some e-mailing and soon it was 05.00 already. I decided to explore Melbourne and took a walk. It brought me over the Yarra river towards the Southbank. Which by the way is a very nice area with lots of restaurants and bars. Walking along the Southbank I had a magnificant view on the centre/skyline of MLB. At this time of the day traffic was very little and besides some people jogging and canoeïng, there was not much activity.
After some talks with people at the boat-clubs, I spotted some rainbow-lorrikeets, nice colorfull birds. Heading downtown via Princess bridge I had a look inside Flinders station, which is a very nice (old) trainstation. It was already getting busier on the streets now.
I walked throught the treasury gardens towards Captain Cook's House and did some more walking throught the city to get some lunch later on. Then it started to rain, but apparently they have a saying in MLB: if you don´t like the weather, wait for 10 minutes. And yes, it became dry again.
Right accross my hotel, on the corner of Spencer and Flinders was a nice hostel. Well, that means they had a nice bar and a lot of young folks. Had a few nice nights there during that week.
During the week I had to work and my hosts took me out for diner to a.o. China Town, Southbank of course and one night I went to Berwick which is still considered as Melbourne, but it was over one hour driving to get there.
The funny thing with Australian people is that a lot of them seem to be related to Dutch people, so everywhere you go, they tried to speak Dutch to me. It was fun after getting tired of the famous line "Howdy mate, howyu dung?". Most of them are even able to say it without looking at you :)
O, I forgot to mention that one Sunday morning I climbed (by elevator) the Bourke Place. The top at 254 mtr had a magnificant view. This is a must do when you´re there!
Cheers mate!
The hotel is uniquely positioned to experience a full variety of Melbourne's most celebrated attractions like the Telstra Dome, cosmopolitan shopping areas and the Yarra River's South bank with its diversity of restaurants, bars and casino. The exhibition complex on the other side of the Yarra River is within walking distance as well.
The hotel is 25 kilometres from Melbourne's international and domestic airport and it took me about 30 minutes by cab to get there.
The hotel offers magnificently rooms that are a sanctuary of refined elegance and modern convenience. Most rooms I have seen in this hotel are different of style. Some rooms are located next to the rail-track and can be noisy.
My room had 2 stores, 1st floor was living with a small kitchen in it and upstairs I had my bath- and bedroom with a vide which made me able to look down in the living area.
The bathroom was not incredible huge, but for 1 person it was sufficient and had everything in there I needed.
The first floors are rented-out-appartments. I even managed to get lost in this hotel at night due to some closed doors, I somehow got in the resedential part of this building while I was suffering from a jetlag.
There is a small Library Lounge Bar where you can have a drink at night and there is a small restaurant for breakfast. I dont know if you can also have dinner, byt hey, the Southbank is a 5min walk. The Piano Bar is also nice to have a beer after a hard day of work. You can also relax in the Champagne Bar that has a selection of exceptional European champagne brands, exciting new tapas and live music.
There is also a swimming-pool (indoors) which I did not use, so no comment!
Just across the street are two small supermarkets (one of them a night shop and liquer store) which are noth good alternatives for the expensive minibar (which was actually a large refrigerator).
