Australia

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Our last day in Melbourne. Yarra Valley Winery Tours

We met across the street from the Federation Square at 9 am for some wine tasting. Yarra Valley is about 25 minutes from the city. Unlike many of our tours, this tour was filled with many young people who were ready to drink and mingle all before lunchtime. We visited three wineries and every vineyard owner was extremely nice, fun, and full of jokes. We sipped wine with two English people, one which had recently moved to Melbourne, a Korean couple on their honeymoon, and a German girl who was in town for a wedding. After two wineries we had a delicious 3 course lunch and chatted some more.

After our wine tour, we headed back to Melbourne to catch the season opener Footy game. This game is a combination of rugby and American football. The cool thing about the game is that the patrons are allowed to bring in food and drinks into the stadium. The 2 men next to us had a cooler filled with sandwiches and snacks and a thermos filled with coffee which was absolutely allowed. Unnecessarily, Vicky did not bring a purse to ensure a speedy delivery thru security. Also, during halftime, the entire stadium went empty. Everyone was outside throwing around a footy and socializing. Hundreds of footies were being tossed and kicked around outside; it really created a friendly and family atmosphere. Eric and Vicky headed to Federation Square after halftime and caught the last 10 minutes of the game on a Jumbotron with many other locals sitting on the lawn cheering for their teams. Soon after the game ended we headed to the bus station to get our airport transfer bus ticket. The young gentleman at the ticket counter knew just as much about Chicago sports than any native Chicago sports fanatic. He carried a long conversation with us about the Bulls and D. Rose and our baseball teams, he shared his love for Jay Cutler, and asked what we did when the Blackhawks won the championship. The love for Chicago sports was very apparent in Australia. We saw 3 Aussies wear Bulls shirts, that’s a long way for a shirt to travel.

Australian Word of the Day: Hungry Jack=Burger King

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