Melbourne Take 2

We got up late, and booked an airport transfer and hostels in Brisbane following our change of plans yesterday. Nicola was on hostel selecting duty after I let myself down on the current choice of accommodation and needed a spell of rehabilitation before I could be trusted to choose decent digs again. I'll give you a little run down of why my decision to stay at "The Ritz for Backpackers" was not a good one...

1. Far too many "longstayers" at the hostel; longstayers is the term for people who literally live in a hostel. One resident had been living in the hostel for 10 months. When we would walk into/past/near any of the communal facilities we would feel like we had intruded/trespassed into someone else's house...very awkward.
2. Loads of really "cool" residents i.e. 29 year old freshers. One bloke in particular had to announce really loudly how he had taken loads of acid, speed and coke over the last few days...a few cretins in the room with us seemed impressed.
3. Bathroom/toilet doors with windows which allowed people to see in...needs no further explanation really.
4. "Free Wifi" only available in communal areas which, as explained above, was not the most convenient to use.
5. Everybody who worked at the hostel were backpacker longstayers i.e. were not the most useful and were more keen on partying than doing their job.
6. Our room consisted of a bed and a wardrobe...
7. Random screams in the night from, probably, the really cool bloke on acid.
8. It was in St Kilda, which is really not as nice as made out.
9. It was above a pub.
10. Nicola thought it smelled of feet.

After sorting out our escape route from the Ritz, we met up with an old friend of mine from home, Scott, who had emigrated to the Melbourne area around 18 months ago. He met us outside out hostel and we drove into the city, parking in the extremely huge Crown Casino complex. 

We had a wander through the CBD and stopped at "Grill'd" for a burger, on Scott's recommendation it was the best burger he ever had...in fairness, my burger was pretty awesome (try the Pickle and Mustard option if ever you are in Melbourne, scrumptious). After a quick bite to eat where I convinced Scott and Nicola that we should go to an ice lounge later that evening, we headed to a clothes shop so Scott could purchase some shoes (he was wearing flip flop which wouldn't have been ideal in an ice lounge).

After our quick shopping trip we headed to Federation Square and to a pretty cool bar, where I tried another Aussie beer, this time "Nine Wells Amb(l)er Ale" - which was really nice. Before I came out to Australia, I had been told by some people that the beer over here was horrible - from my relatively short exposure to local beer I was most impressed.

We chilled in the bar for an hour or so having a good catch up before Scott took us to see the MCG (Melbourne Cricket Ground), the famous cricket and Aussie Rules 90,000 seater stadium. In fairness, if you like sport, Melbourne is a safe bet. Opposite the MCG is the Rod Laver Stadium, home of the Australian Open (one of Tennis' four "Grandslam" events), there is also the Melbourne F1, and a host of other large stadiums for football and rugby.

We then went to the Crown Complex for a look around - it is MASSIVE. There was a huge gambling area, which, given that it was around 15:00 on a Wednesday afternoon, was packed. It was also a hotel, conference centre, had a mall, restaurants, spas and even a laser zone and bowling alley!

After the visit to the Crown we went to "Chill On", a ski lodge themed bar with an ice bar. It had been my suggestion to go there, and in my head I pictured something James Bond like, maybe like something from the "Die Another Day" movie. I had high expectations...it failed to deliver. For a $30 entrance fee we basically stood in a converted meat storage freezer for 20 minutes wrapped in a thick jacket and wearing two layers of gloves at a very cold -10 degrees. The ice bar was small, and there were only three other guests at the time. And to top it off, the ONLY bartender at the bar was from CARDIFF...what are the chances! Although, on the plus side most of the things inside the bar were made of ice, including table and stools and also the bar was made of ice, which at first was cool (wahey!) but the novelty wore off when we placed our cocktails (in a glass made of ice) onto the bar and they just slid straight across the surface and nearly on to the floor.

Despite my catalogue of poor choices, we had a very nice day and were starting to see Melbourne in a more positive light...it helped that the weather was quite nice today!