Going Round the Twist on the Great Ocean Road.

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Howdy

Quite a lot has happened since the Neighbours Night: some of it I could control, but alas some of it I couldn't.

Me, Wilson and Bully went for a tour of the Rod Laver Arena, the place where the Australian Tennis Open is held in January every year. Outside the stadium there are a few statues of Australia's greatest ever players including unsuprisingly Rod Laver, who done a grand slam of the Grand Slams twice in his career (Aka The Aussie Open, French Open, Wimbledon, US Open in the same calendar year!) I'd thought Rod Laver was dead until Bull corrected me: telling how Federer had cried when he'd met his idol at this years Aussie Open. Laver was a bit of a freak (In a nice way), one of his arms was twice the size of the other and his forearm was as big as Muhammed Alis!!! No wonder he was so good.

We were shown around the grounds, including the "Margaret Court Court", she was another Aussie Tennis legend who, as you can see, was quite appropriately named for a tennis player. Apparently the public can play on all of the courts (except the Rod Laver Arena) for only $20-50 per hour- absolute bargain! We were shown around the locker rooms, unfortunately as the Aussie Open wasn't in play Maria Sharapova was nowhere in sight. Our guide told us a few stories about which players were superstitious and insisted on the same locker every year: Federer couldn't give a monkeys whereas David Nalbandian is really into his mind gamess and wouldn't think twice about getting one over on his opponent by stealing their favourite locker. We were also shown the press room, where the players are obliged to face the world's media after each game.

Finally we walked down the corridor on the way to the Rod Laver Court: this is the walk that the players in the Final have to do. It must be quite intimidating for less established players going to play on this court as the whole corridor is adorned with huge posters of all the past winners of the Open looking down on them, it must make them feel quite caustrophobic, especially if they're playing the Fed Express in the final like Bagdhatis was this year.

Unfortunately the court itself was covered up when we arrived because Coldplay had a gig there the next night. After a few photos we saw the trophies that the winners of The Open get each year- the players only get a small model of the trophy and don't get to keep the main one. Maybe if Federer wins five they'll let him keep it like Liverpool got to keep the European Cup!

The next day me and Bully caught a tram to St Kilda, a nearby district of Melbourne. It was quite a sunny day when we went but you can imagine that the place is buzzing in the summer when it's actually hot. There are palm trees all around the Esplanade and there is a shipwreck on the beach. We had a walk up the pier, which was so windy, and got some good views of the city centre of Melbourne in the distance. Back in the nineteenth century the Pier was a place where all of the expats liked to go to escape the scorching weather in the city.

At night we went to bed early cos we'd hired a car for the next day. Jonny went into a bit more detail about this book series he's thinking of writing (Don't know where he's gonna find the time, what with his blossoming Asian singing career and his chain of Sprigwells Coffee Shops!) The first book is called Espionage in Paris, so called, because Sprigens felt this was the book title that would appeal to someone like me more than any other title in the world. The lead character is a spy called Christopher Barrington, he has a girlfriend called Jane Quenchful because, wait for it, she'll leav you thirsty for more!?! I keep telling Jonny he should think of some plot rather than merely thinking of catchy titles and names that he can make puns about. Barrington's nemesis is called Officer Dickhead by the way, and the second book (theat will be published after the obvious success of Espionage in Paris) is gonna becalled Espionage in Moscow: Everyone's Russian Around!!

The next day we were up bright and early to do one of the most famous road trips in the world, The Great Ocean Road. The Great Ocean Road was actually constructed as a War Memorial, built by World War I Soldiers in memory of their fallen comrades. The Road runs from about 80 km west of Melbourne until you are over half way to Adelaide. We decided to hire a car for the trip, with me, Jonny and Dan as the designated drivers. Dan had his I-Pod with him, so we had that blaring out of the speakers for most of the next two days- the rules were no repeats and the person in the front passenger seat was DJ, things were going great until Dans stint on Day 2 where we were treated to obscure Phil Collins songs?!?!

None of us had driven an Automatic before but our fears about how hard this would be were soon put to rest when we realised that a monkey could do it (It's just like playing on Daytona USA or summat?!) After navigating ourselves out of the City and onto the Freeway our first port of call was a secluded beach somewhere, the weather was sunny aswell which was pretty lucky fot this time of year. Next we went to Bell's Beach, a surfers beach where the film Point Break (I've never sen it) was filmed.

Back on the road, we passed Mad Max's House (Not Max Hoyland from neighbours, but the Max that made Mel Gibson famous before the days where he'd just be in films that portrayed the English in a bad light!) If you've not seen these films then i'm sure you'll recognise the next place we visited (As long as your under the age of 30). Our next port of call was a lighthouse, not just any old lighthouse though: this was the lighthouse where the Kids show Round the Twist was filmed! "Have you ever had a thought like this, when strange things happen, are you going round the Twist?!) Apart from the Lighthouse itself in which i got a few photos of Jonny, who is basically an older version of Bronson the Ginger Kid in the program, there were some great views of the Ocean and coastline. We were very la-de-da and went for tea and scones (The great debate on how it's pronounced goes on) in the cafe by the Lighthouse.

We stopped for Fish and Chips in a town called Lorne, Will incidenatly felt he had the best Tartar Sauce he'd ever had here (again, the debate on how it's pronounced goes on). Our final main stop on Day 1 was the Tweleve Apostles: these are the highlight of the Ocean Road and are basically large rocks that pertrude out of the ocean- alas one of them crumbled to the seabed last year and in a few hundred thousand years none of them will remain (So if you wanna see them, you best book your ideas up!) They did look spectacular, and although we were pleased that the sun was out it meant that the sun was in our eyes when we were trying to get photos of them.

We stayed at a the YHA hostel in Port Fairy that night, our room was in an old Coach House! we thought we'd be freezing at night but it wasn't too bad. We stayed up to watch the Germans beat the Argies on penalties in the World Cup.

Day 2 of the trip we headed to the Grampian Mountains via the town of Hamilton for a cake and a coffee (The weather was shocking so it was like we could have ben in Scotland) We passed through the town of Tarrington, which gave us an opportunity to think of another potential book in Jonny's series: Espionage in Country Australia: Barrington in Tarrington! After more Barrington based escapades we were on the way to the Town of Halls Green in the Grampians when we realised we'd almost ran out of petrol- this would not be a good place to break down we thought as we were in the middle fo forest- Jonny telling us stories of a Taggart episode where someone gets murdered didn't qualm our worries much either! As Michael Burke would say on 999, "luckily they all survived"- we made it to a petrol station as the light was flashing empty, phew.

We had planned to go to a waterfall but the road to it was closed due to falling trees, instead we headed to a viewpoint high up into the mountains, up a long windey road. Upon arrival it was so foggy that the view wasn't quite so amazing- as you can see from the photo it was like staring into an abys of White! In the Grampians we drove past a Stag (Why'd they have to call it Stag!) in the forest and a Wallaby hopped right across the road in front of our car, thankfully we didn't hit it: i didn't want to be the one that had to finish it of to put it out of it's misery.

With our tail between our legs we drove to the town of Ballarat, a few hundred Kms to the west of Melbourne. Here i had yet another cake and coffee, i'm gonna get myself a repuation, before we headed back to Melbourne as darkness descended. When we got back we were all knackered and were gonna get some sleep but we were too excited about the football- England Vs Portugal. As you know, it didn't go to plan- We were all absolutely devestated, at no staged did i think we weren't gonna go through. Didn't think it would be possible to hate Cristiano Ronaldo as much as i already did, but it was.

The next day, waking up to a World Cup without England, we went to watch some AFL- Aussie Rules Football at the MCG (Where England will play Autralia in the Ashes later in the year) Richmond Tigers were playing Collingwood, who apparently are the Manchester United of Aussie Rules, so you can guess who we were supporting! Richmond defied the league positions and absolutely hammered them. The game was quite enjoyable, players just randomly start laying into each other and the players just shrug it off and get on with the game, made me think of a footballer who i've already mentioned... One player broke his leg in a Djibril Cisse stylee (he's gonna be out for over a year) but the game just continued?!!?

As it was our last night in Australia we went out for a meal. We headed to the Italian District of Lygon Street and had an all you can eat: where they kept bringing out Pizza and Pasta, was absolutely stuffed! Me, Dan and Will were up at 4.30am the next day to catch a plane to Christchurch, New Zealand; Jonny and Bull would be catching one later that day.

So we leave Australia with England's World Cup dream in tatters but with so many happy memories: Cairns seems a lifetime ago. Highlights are definitey the Whitsunday Islands and the Fraser Island Safari a well as many a happy night and not so great morning after with a box of goon. Melbourne is probably my favourite cityl and I would be suprised if i don't return again )Maybe for the Ashes in December after a quick lottery win)

Signing off,

Mike

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Photos

The Twelve Apostles
Twas a bit sunny

Round the Twist
(Do your Flies up Bully)

Carl Foggarty
Staring into the Abyss

Me at St Kilda Pier
Melbourne city centre in the background.

Comments

[will and sheila stud]

re- bedroom decoration
hi smudge, went to see your mam and dad last night, thought mam was joking on your blog but the spiderman wallpaper is superb, you'll feel like your in a web. we were rubbish against portugal and we should have won the game in the first half forget the bad pens and rooney sent off. it was very gratifying to see ronaldo in tears last night though, whats the old saying "cheats never prosper". well anyway we are still having a cup final party on sunday with all the regulars here and will has money on italy so that means france will probably win. hope you enjoy nz as much as the other places you have been. take care from all of us in the bronx.