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Published: June 22nd 2009
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The Quarter
Our breakfast place We woke up in the morning and decided that we should go by our Antiparos rule: it's never a bad thing to eat at the same place if the food is amazing. So we went back to The Quarter on Flinders Lane for breakfast, tried something different from the menu and it was still very good. Yum, good start to the day!
Shane and I originally wanted to hire a car and drive down the Great Ocean Road today but we decided the weather was too dismal for us to truly enjoy what looks like a stunning coastal drive and there was still loads to see around Melbourne. We'll get to that next time for sure.
We did decide, however, that seeing ocean was still in order and looking at the map we agreed to walk. The Yarra River runs through Melbourne but the ocean is just a bit further south. So off we went through Federation Square and the arts area. Along the way I bought a funky ring at a street market and we also popped into the National Gallery of Victoria for a couple of hours, which had some good exhibitions.
After the museum we
walked for what seemed like ages, but we could see the ocean in the distance so we knew we get there eventually! Finally, we arrived at the beach and it was beautiful. We walked along the beach to St. Kilda, the playground for the English in the 1800s. The area was quaint and despite the random drizzle loads of people were out and most of them had dogs so we were in dog-watching heaven!
Lunch was Greek in theme, I think we were in the mood from talking about our Greece rule earlier that morning. Then we noticed they had Retsina on the menu and that did it for us. We split BBQ prawns and a Greek salad, which reminded us that we do have a small gripe with the Aussies: why do they put rocket in everything??? At least this time it was easy to pick out.
Fabulous lunch right next to the beach, what to do next? Get some baklava and walk along St. Kilda's Pier, where (drum roll please) we saw some Little Penguins in the wild!!! They live off the side of the pier amongst the rocks and we saw two of them! They
National Gallery of Victoria
The front wall of the NGV using rainwater to make a fountain wall. were protected and you can't use flash photography around them and it was dusk so sadly, no pictures. But my goodness, they were adorable. Our tally in Oz (across 2 trips) for seeing amazing wild animals (ie. not in zoos) is: Kangaroos, a Possum, a Sea Turtle, Whales (a mama and her baby!) and now Penguins! This does not include all the amazing fish and birds we've seen too. What a great country.
We took the tram back into town and relaxed for a while before heading out to dinner. Turns out most restaurants are closed on Sunday. We thought this was a good thing as we would have just gone back to Il Solito Posto again and going twice in one day to restaurants we'd been to before seemed a bit much. So we were forced to try somewhere new. And as I said the other day in my blog, how can we go wrong in Melbourne?
Well, it turns out you can go very, very wrong. We're blaming the hotel concierge for everything, even though we probably should have walked out as soon as we walked into the restaurant. The concierge had recommended a relaxed Thai
place in a nearby hotel. I will spare you the details but it was the worst food ever. We didn't finish half of it. It was so depressing, we have had such amazing food and wine experiences for every meal in Melbourne, we really thought no matter where you went it would be good. Shame on us for not going with our gut. And shame on the concierge.
We got some Magnum ice cream bars to make ourselves feel better and enjoyed the rest of the night with some really bad CSI Miami: lots of head tilting, sun glasses removal and of the course the all-important drama shots. We will definitely have to make up for dinner somehow today.
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SarahKate
non-member comment
YUM!
Oh, that is sad about the Thai food. I've never had a bad meal in Melbourne. Ok, wait... as soon as I typed that I remembered the fruit salad with hair in it I had for brekkie there once. But other than that, it's usually so good! At least you got some ice cream to make it all better!