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Published: December 12th 2010
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Melbourne
Rod Laver Arena. In January we flew down to Melbourne for a weekend of grand slam tennis. We had tickets to the Saturday night matches, which promised much with perennial underachiever, but much loved Aussie favourite, Lleyton Hewitt in action against Marcus Baghdatis. The last time the two met in Melbourne, the match didn't finish until 4am, so the hype was huge. We made our way down to the Rod Laver Arena where the atmosphere was building. Lleyton came out to a huge roar from the crowd, and the warm-up began, with every practice serve getting a cheer. The match commenced and was living up to expectations with two games a piece, when Marcus decided he had an injury and couldn't go on. Cue a very disppointed crowd, now far more focussed on trying to get a glimpse of Lleyton's famous missus (ex Home & Away) leaving the stadium. It is important to note that Aussies aren't huge sports fans - they're fans of Aussies playing sport, mostly when aussies are winning! So why would they bother to stick around for the next match when there were no Aussies in it despite paying a fortune for a ticket and only watching half an hour
Melbourne
Soaking up the atmosphere before the big game. of tennis? Being tight pommes, we did stick around and thoroughly enjoyed the ladies singles match that followed. In fact, we enjoyed it so much that we went back to our hotel and bought Ground Passes for the Sunday. This meant we could wander round and join any outside court that had a free seat. Top of the bill was the Williams sisters in action in the doubles so we got there early and claimed our seats in the sun. Watching Venus and Serena in action was something else. Determined, focussed, powerful, noisy, impressive. Their opponents put up a good fight in a very entertaining match but the Williams sisters claimed victory in straight sets, and later went on to win the title. Laura realised that the weekend had made a lasting impression on her when she caught glimpses of people staring at her on the flight back. A smirk from Andy confirmed that 'sunburnt' was an understatement, and apparently scarlet was the new 'in' colour. Laura would like to publicly thank her work colleagues for being too polite to point out the fact that she looked utterly ridiculous for the whole of the following week.
We had a
Melbourne
Lleyton in action. couple of great weekends away in February, the first of which was to celebrate ten years of the winning Willis-Brett combo. To celebrate our anniversary we headed to the Gold Coast for all things fancy, and, as it turned out, the mother of all thunder storms. The second weekend was a rainforest retreat in Binna Burra, courtesy of Andy's parents. Sitting on our verandah, we were quite surprised when we realised there was a white furry bum hidden amongst the leaves of the nearest tree. The bum belonged to a snoozing koala, who had the decency to remain in the tree even after we'd been out for a walk, thus maximising all photo opportunities.
In March, Andy's parents, Alan and Sheila, arrived for another visit. We took them to Bargara to see the baby turtles hatch and wiggle their way into the sea in the moonlight. For Easter, we headed to Stanthorpe, the coldest place in Queensland, but a very pretty cold place. A stunning house in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by cows, awaited us. Having enjoyed some very pleasant walks around Girraween National Park, we decided to venture further afield to find the more remote Sundown National
Melbourne
Williams sisters about to kick some butt. Park. Here we set off on a walking track, disturbing the occasional roo along the way in very pleasant surroundings. At some point though, a wrong turn may have been taken, and the pleasant stroll materialised into an arduous trudge through some extremely long, scratchy, sticky grass. All credit to Alan and Sheila who did a very convincing impression of not being at all upset with their navigators, and pretending that they weren't at all distressed by being made to walk through the overgrown australian bush in shorts.
We decided to treat Alan and Sheila to some proper Aussie culture by taking them to see the awesome Brisbane Lions in action. A sold out crowd at the Gabba made for a fantastic introduction to the world of AFL (aussie rules) as Brisbane took on Carlton in a huge grudge match, having just signed Carlton's star player. They survived the encounter remarkably well, managing not be too bemused by the apparent lack of rules or the players fondness for 'a bit of biffo'. They even got to see a fantastic Lions comeback, sealing victory in the final quarter, which of course meant that we got to sing the club song
Brisbane
Gecko vs Stick Insect - "We are the pride of Brisbane town, we wear maroo-on, blue and gold....." (all set to the theme of the Marseillaise, obviously).
Our final weekend away was to Moreton Island, a sand island just off the coast of Brisbane. We stayed at Tangalooma, a resort that focuses on the local wildlife, where the staff research and monitor the neighbourhood dolphins in particular. Every night, around dusk, the dolphins swim into the shore and take fish from the rangers and guests. Naturally, we couldn't resist, so, on a very wet night, we waded into the sea, and under the guidance of the ranger took turns to feed a couple of wild dolphins by hand. Despite the rain, we stayed and watched until all the fish had been eatee and the ranger had rung the underwater bell that let the dolphins know their supper time was over until the next night. The other main attraction of Tangalooma is the underwater playground created by the deliberate sinking of shipwrecks just metres off the shore. We donned our snorkel gear and headed towards the rusting hulks emerging from the water. Alan and Sheila supervised from the beach. The change was amazing -
Binna Burra
Cool tree in the rainforest. a very dull swim out to the wrecks, looking at nothing but sand, was instantly replaced on arrival at the wrecks by a world of fish. Whilst fighting the current was a challenge, not least making sure that the waves didn't thrust you into the side of a ship with rusty pointy bits sticking out, we were rewarded by our first ever sighting of a lionfish and even a wobbegong shark. Wobbegong's aren't dangerous, although if provoked Steve Irwin stylee are known to bite and not let go. Nonetheless, they're pretty darn big, and the one we saw certainly made us stop and gasp temporarily. We were also joined for breakfast on our last day by a very tame kookaburra, who watched on as we demolished our fruit and pancakes.
Alan and Sheila got to see a little bit more of the land down under than originally intended when the Icelandic Versuvius decided to traumatise air travel with its spewing ash. This meant Sheila got to enjoy picking avocado out of every meal she was served for an extra week or so. Every cloud has a silver lining.
In June we got caught up in the excitement of
Binna Burra
Grasshopper. State of Origin when Queensland takes on New South Wales in the annual best-of-three rugby league competition. With the series 1-0 in Queenslands favour we got to witness history as the 'Marowns' thrashed the Blues to win the fifth series in a row.
More stuff we've learnt:
Aussies like to win. During the Winter Olympics virtually any competitor who had ever set foot in Oz was claimed as an Australian. If the judges dared not to award a medal to an Aussie competitor, an enquiry was held.
Claiming people as Aussie is not limited to sports....evidently the Bee Gees, AC/DC, and Russell Crowe are all Aussie too?!
Aussies cannot pronounce any words that stem from outside the English language. For instance when it's the big climax to the end of a TV series it is not called the 'season finale' but the 'season final'. Mexican food seems to suffer quite badly - for nachos, read nach-oss........similarly for tacos. For such a big wine drinking nation you would think that pinot grigio would roll off the tongue....it does not (read pin-ott grigg-io)
Having said that, it is equally as impossible for a pomme to pronounce an aussie
Binna Burra
Andy pointing out a furry friend nearby. place name correctly without having heard it pronounced by others first e.g. Indooroopilly (pronounced In-dra-pilly) or Capalaba (pronounced Ca- pal-abar). Have a go at Woolloomooloo.
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Angela Smyth
non-member comment
Amazing
Looks like you're still having an amazing time. I love the blog updates - keep them coming!