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Published: November 20th 2007
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11 Hours on a Train Thursday, August 30th was spent on a train.
For 11 hours, Danae and I headed through the farmland of central New South Wales and into Victoria, the state just south of NSW. We saw many sheep and an endless supply of rolling hills. And we learned about some interesting town names, such as my favourite, The Rock.
Highlight of the trip: the staff thinking we were tourists. Well I guess we were but like they thought we were fresh off the plane tourists or something. And they thought Danae was foreign, which was extra funny. One guy approached us and said he'd "heard" we wanted to see kangaroos. We said no, we hadn't said such things. He nonetheless promised we'd see some when we got to Victoria. Funnily enough, Danae saw them and I didn't.
Lowlight of the trip, and this is a big one: Danae had her luggage stolen! And it was her skating bag with her skates and dresses in it! And it's now over 2 months later and we still haven't gotten the bag back. Our biggest question is what someone in some country town where there's no ice rink
for miles is going to do with a pair of ice skates...
We arrived safely in Melbourne, despite the shock of losing Danae's skates, and checked into our hostel. We were staying in the polar opposite of Sydney Central - St. Arnaud's Guest House. This place was small and quaint, a little outside the city but near some good attractions and right on the tram line. It also had Foxtel (aka cable TV) which I hadn't seen for a LONG time. We were so exhausted (and shaken up) that first night that we just sat and watched TV. Highlight of the TV: I saw The Daily Show and Colbert Report for the first (and it remains the only) time since I arrived!! Oh how I love those shows...
Day out in Melbourne Friday, Danae and I headed out for a day in Melbourne. We took the tram to the city centre and saw the icons of Flinders Station and Federation Square. They were pretty. We also visited the Tourist Info centre to figure out what to do in this town. We discovered that the answer was not much (although everyone in Melbourne insists there is lots to do).
View of The Rock!
Best town on the Sydney->Melbourne train That day we did a self-guided walking tour given to us at the info centre. It took us through Melbourne's famous alleyways with shops and cafes. Feels a lot like Europe. A highlight for me was seeing a spruiker outside a bargain clothing store!
That night we met up with an old friend of mine - Dana, one of the Canadians I met on the plane to Hong Kong and spent a day in HK with! She took us to Chapel Street, a popular street in the suburb of South Yarra where she lives (and where we were staying). The street is filled with restaurants and night clubs. We had some delicious Italian food for dinner (I'd been craving pasta, I don't know why) then went out for a night on the town! It was good fun!
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