3 Nights In Melbourne

 I have a soft spot for Melbourne, may be it is because the best part of my 6 years were spent in this city as a student, or is it because Melbourne has been ranked No.1 as the world’s “Most Liveable City” for the second year in a row by the Economist Intelligence Unit’s liveability survey?

That's yours truly on the left, at the Melbourne Essendon Airport; 1967.

46 years after that picture was taken, me and Le General heads for the city I love :)

We landed at Melbourne Airport, Thursday; at 8.30 am.

We got a mild shock when we join the Q at the immigration check out, a couple of planes from China must have arrived at the same time; we were swamped by hundreds (look more like thousands) of Chinese tourists!

Took us 90 minutes to pass through the check point!

We made our way to the Sky Bus stand, we bought a return ticket; A$28.00 each. Don't even consider taking a cab, unless you just won Lotto ;)

The BIG, fast; Sky Bus took us to the Southern Cross Station where we changed to a smaller hotel transfer bus. It is very efficient, and in 40 minutes we were outside our hotel.

Chill Out and Déjà Vu With Good Friends In Brisbane :)

We arrived Brisbane domestic airport after our non-stop, 5 touristy days in Sydney.

We were a bit stunned by the SIZE of this domestic terminal! It must be 20 to 50 times larger than our Wellington terminal!

What we did not realise is that Brisbane Airport  is the sole passenger airport serving Brisbane, Queensland and is the third busiest airport in Australia after Sydney Airport and Melbourne Airport. Brisbane Airport has won many awards. Brisbane is currently served with 46 domestic destinations in all States and Territories and 32 international destinations. For the 12 months ending May 2011 total passengers were 20,056,416!

The reason we came to Brisbane was to catch up with our good friends from Karori, Boon and Jackie (B&J). They moved to Brisbane in 2005 and that was the last time we had a chill out with them, goodness; EIGHT years has vaporised!

Boon took a shot of me and LB near the South Bank, Brisbane in 2005.

Zǒu Mǎ Kàn Huā @ Sydney & Brisbane - day 4

Day 4, last day in Sydney; so we will try to see and do what we wanted! We will be flying off to Brisbane the next day:)

I know there is one shopping complex I do not want to miss, not for shopping but to eat the famous Japanese ramen I heard so much about! the complex we wanted to go is Westfield Sydney Shopping Centre.

Again, from where we stay; we are able to walk there!

Westfield claimed they have 3,000+ brands and 1 million + products!  So who is counting??

Zǒu Mǎ Kàn Huā @ Sydney & Brisbane - day 3

Day 3, we found out that from where we stayed; we can walk our way to Sydney's Chinatown in 20 minutes!

I have read that Sydney's Chinatown is the largest in Australia. It is located in Haymarket, between Central Station and Darling Harbour. Unlike the Chinatowns in some other countries, Sydney's Chinatown has been relatively free of crime and hygiene issues.

I reckoned you have not visit Chinatown if you do not enjoy a "Yum Char" in this Chinese business district!

Market City, the outer walls of the original vegetable market, built in 1909, were preserved and restored as an example of Edwardian architecture. They were part of the original city markets—designed by city architect C.Broderick—which were bounded by Hay Street, Quay Street and Thomas Street. They were built to replace the old Belmore Market, which had failed because it was too far from Darling Harbour.

Zǒu Mǎ Kàn Huā @ Sydney & Brisbane - day 2

Day 2 at Sydney... we took the train to Circular Quay which is the hub of Sydney Harbour, the quay is a vibrant, bustling place with ferries leaving every few minutes to different parts of the harbour, including Manly.

On the southern side of Circular Quay is a walkway that leads to the Sydney Opera House and Royal Botanical Gardens; while on the northern side, a short walk along lovely landscaped walkways takes you to the Harbour Bridge and The Rocks.

Zǒu Mǎ Kàn Huā @ Sydney & Brisbane - day 1

Zǒu Mǎ Kàn Huā  走马看花 [to gain a superficial understanding through cursory observation; given only a passing glance at things; giving a hurried and cursory glance]

I finally made up my mind to use up my accumulated Qantas Frequent Flyer points, after days of deliberations we decided to spend four nights in Sydney then hop over to Brisbane catching up with Boon and Jackie; the last time we stay with them in Brisbane was 8 years ago!

Somehow it seems a bit silly that even by using up my 72,000 points, each of us still have to fork out NZ$ 600.00 for the trip! "Severing" relationship with the flying kangaroos is not cheap ;)

So on the 22nd of March we were at the Wellington airport staring at Gollum chasing rainbow trouts :)