Something I had always wanted to do was go on a holiday with my Mum and sisters, just the girls! But sadly we never had the chance before Mum passed away 2 years ago.
So I put the idea forward to both my sisters that we hit Melbourne for 5 nights!! One sister has a trip planned for next year so decided to give it a miss so my other sister and I got to it and started planning.
It was such a lovely time but sooooo exhausting!!!
Not to mention May is not the best time of year to go to Melbourne. I found the weather alot like Wellington. Cold, windy and wet. But that's okay if you pay money to see a city you have to see it I guess. So the trusty old puffer jacket was an essential. And an umbrella was a waste of time.
Not to mention the transport system....... which is AWESOME when you work out how to use it!!!
It took us one day to get our bearings. And two days to work out the transport. The first day we walked out of our motel and walked into town. We knew we were staying on Londsdale St but when it was time to get out the map and head home (whilst feet are dying) we realized we didn't know which end of the street our motel was on. The lady at the info center asked if we walked up hill or down hill as we walked to town. We had no idea.
And on the second to last day after walking everyday to find a tram station, we realized we were 20 meters from one of the big tram stations. Which is why every morning when we stepped out of our motel we were picked up by a stampede of what I called ants at work! Everyone was getting off at the station all wearing black business suits on their way to work.
As you can see there was not much use doing the hair!
The highlight of my trip was Sovereign Hill village at Ballarat, which is a working historical village which you can purchase products from and the people are dressed in character.
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Having a sing along around a fire. |
Tending the vegie garden.
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| One of the shop ladies. |
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| I actually found gold!! And brought it home a little bottle. |
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| Schools have camps at the village and dress in costume and re-live the daily routine of a child in the early mining days. |
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| The queens birthday celebration. |
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| Dinner at a VERY flash restaurant. Check out the size of the wine glass!! |
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| The historical buildings are so beautiful. |
The main street entertainment was cool and watching the little kids dancing in the street.
We thought we would walk to the markets for the morning, but who would have known it would take a whole day to get around the whole place. It was truly an experience.
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| A cute little french cafe at the markets. |
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| Now this is the tram we had to look out for. The 'city circle'. |
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| My sister Charlene and I riding the tram. It was alot of fun! We had some great conversations with strangers. |
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| This is us waiting for the next tram. We got off at the wrong stop and had to wait 15 mins for the next tram. Was very funny!! |
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| And this is literally what I did at the end of every day!!! |
We never cooked a meal but we also didn't eat out every night. We were too shattered!! We ordered in a few times.
It was a great trip with great memories!! And it was lovely to spend that time with my sister. Even tho she probably got really tired and frustrated with my map reading and direction skills. (not my gifting)
I appreciated the opportunity to share this experience and memories with my sister.
We will have to plan another one so all 3 of us can go!!!!
