Melbourne, City of Rain

Really, Melbourne is not very rainy, but October is its rainiest month and this year has been particularly rainy due to a La Nina weather pattern. So, we saw a lot of rain in Melbourne.

We were not super impressed with Melbourne. There is nothing wrong with the city, we just didn't find a lot to love, and the weather likely had had an effect on our feelings.

The city is sort of a mini New York, with lots of skyscrapers, but it does have some cool, old buildings, including its original train station:

The Victoria public library is spectacular, with a main reading room that looks more like a university library:

After a couple of days of bad rain where we spent time at the hotel gym, in museums and basically not seeing a lot, on our third day we finally had some better weather. We took advantage with a long walk through Melbourne's beautiful Royal Botanical Gardens:

Not sure what exactly that is supposed to be, but Shana liked it. We had great views back to the city from the gardens:

From there, it was a short walk to Melbourne Park, where the Austailian Open is contested. Since this is the thing that many people associate Melbourne with, we thought we would get a couple of pictures:

Our final day in Melbourne was even more beautiful, so we continued our exploration of the city, including this monument to the original British founders of the city:

Frankly, given all we have seen about the Aboriginal people of Australia, this momument from 1997 seemed to strike a bit of a discordant note with respect to the colinization of the country. But, the photo does show what a beautiful day it was.

Later, we were walking and hearing bells that we thought were church bells, but it turned out that it was music from the Federation Bells, which were created for the centenial of the founding of the Australian confederation in 1901:

These bells are really cool because anyone can write music for them (they sound three hours a day every day of the year). We had never seen anything quite like this before. Shana was ready to roll out a yoga mat and meditate next to them. 

Then, shortly after seeing the bells, we were walking along the river and we saw a horse. But, it turned out that this was not just any horse. This was Twilight Payment, the wire-to-wire winner of the 2020 Melbourne Cup (as a 25-to-1 underdog!):

So, what is the Melbourne Cup? It is the biggest horse race in Australia, which takes place on the first Tuesday of November (i.e. in two days time). Although the race is big accross the country, it is actually an official holiday here in Melbourne. So, the fact that this horse is a former winner, is actually a really big deal. Twilight Payment is now retired (he was eight when he won the race), but was in town for some promotional photos, and his handlers were super nice, so we got some shots with the former champion:

Nearby where we met Twilight Payment, there was a cool exhibit of Aboriginal art. These are some shields, which can of course be for defense in combat, but are also used for ceremonial purposes. They are a major part of traditional aboriginal art:

The last thing we want to mention about our time in Melbourne is that we reconnected with some speical people we met on a tour in Thailand in 2010 (!). During our time in Phuket, we took a kayaking tour through very narrow caves into hollow islands. On the trip we met a doctor from Melbourne (Dr. Tony) and his daughter Romy, whe was then about to have her bat mitzvah. The rest of the family had skipped the tour because it had been raining horribly that morning, and they decided not to face the weather. As it turned out, the weather cleared and we had a fantastic tour. Since Dr. Tony had some video of us, and we had pictures of them, we exchanged information and later photos/videos. All these years later, we contacted Tony, and met him and Romy, who is now a NICU nurse, for a drink:

It was quite fun catching up with them, and we told them if they are ever in Europe to let us know.

Now, we head out on the road for much of the next week. More to come.

Jeff and Shana

Canberra, the Capital

It seems that most people skip Canberra as a destination. With Sydney, Melbourne, and the Great Barrier Reef, everyone has different priorities. We’re glad we made the stop along the way for several reasons (1) the drive between Sydney and Canberra is scenic; (2) there are wineries in the Canberra region; and (3) Canberra’s history as the capital is unique.

It’s spring here in Australia, which means rain. While the rain has had limited impact on our plans so far, it followed us the entire day driving from Sydney to Canberra, which made the drive less enjoyable and picturesque. Most of the lookout points were socked in with mist and fog. One highlight of the “Grand Pacific Drive,” is the Sea Cliff Bridge, which is built out over the ocean to avoid the inevitable falling rocks. It is a very cool place and we walked along a bit of it in the rain:

Our next stop was the Nan Tien Temple, the largest Buddhist temple complex in the southern hemisphere. It opened in 1995 and we were there on “Wellness Day,” which attracted a big crowd. We arrived too late for the yoga class that day.

We had pie for lunch – Australian meat pies at Robertson Pie Shop, which has been serving pies of all types since 1961. Although we enjoyed the pies, in the end they are basically pot pies, and we have tried them and that's that.

The Fitzroy Falls (80 m high) were in good form, thanks to the heavy rains, but that limited our view and meant we didn’t linger long.

Finally, we stopped in Goulburn to see the Big Merino, because that’s what you do when passing through. Seriously, it is the main reason to stop in Goulburn, Australia. We drove by the Big Potato earlier in the day but didn’t stop (we know how disappointed you all are).

Canberra was selected to be the capital due to the need for a “neutral” site – the rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne has been raging for some time. It was formally established in 1913 and designed in large part by American architects. It is a planned city – it reminded us of Orange County, specifically Irvine, with its wide boulevards and clear signage. It has a great food scene and all the sights a capital should have, including the National Gallery, Australian War Memorial and Parliament.

We spent the first day wine tasting. The area is known for its “cool climate” wines, which means that the vines don’t need to struggle to produce grapes. The wines we tasted were good overall. We liked Contentious Character's wines, but really liked its sense of humor as you can see from how they name their wines:

We finished the day with the Last Post ceremony at the War Memorial:

The second day we got lucky with the weather, despite the forecast for yet more rain. We rented bikes and rode around Burley Griffin Lake – an artificial lake that is central to Canberra’s design. It provides great recreational opportunities and access to the main sites. We stopped at the National Museum (natural history) and the Art Gallery during our circuit. It was a super fun way to see the city.

At the National Gallery of Art there is an amazing display of aboriginal art made up of 200 hollow log coffins created to memorialize the aboriginals who died defending their land in the first 200 years of British domination (1788-1988). The path through the coffins represents the Glyde River, with the coffins for each artist's tribe placed approximately where their lands lay. The piece is highly effective and beautiful:

It is hard to imagine a display such as this in a major American art museum.

Canberra was a worthy stop! Onward to Melbourne.

Shana & Jeff

Third Stop - Sydney

After a surprisingly easy flight from Singapore, we arrived in Sydney and spent an entire week getting to know the city. We stayed in a long-stay hotel so our room had a small kitchen, which allowed us to eat breakfast in every day and enjoy several take-out meals, which was good for both the wallet and the waistline. Overall, we liked, but did not love, Sydney. There was nothing in particular that we did not like, we just didn't get that feeling when we really love a city. 

Shana connected with an old friend who now lives in Sydney, and on our first day we met up with her and took a long walk through the city and around the Royal Botanical Gardens. There is no doubt that the city is absolutely beautiful:

We took advantage of the natural beauty to do two long walks both along the beaches to the east of Sydney starting at the famous Bondi Beach (bond-EYE, not bond-E as we thought), ending at Coogee Beach. Among other things, we saw a number of the city's ocean pools:

The second walk went from Spit Bridge to Manly, on the north end of Sydney Harbor. 

That walk included seeing many local birds including this Laughing Kookaburra, which sat so nicely for a photo:

As well as some aboriginal carvings in the rocks along the way:

There was no shortage of opportunities to see the Opera House and Harbor Bridge from various vantage points around the city.

We also spent a bit of time in the Sydney Museum and the Australian Museum (both free!), mostly learning about the history of each, especially relating to the country's many indigenous tribes. While much of this history mirrors what happened in other colonial locations, including the US, we were fascinated by the details, especially with respect to the interactions between the First Fleet, which arrived in 1788, and the native population. We noted that Australia seems to have done much more, if still not enough, to address this history and try to make amends for the actions of colonial Australians and their governments over the last 200+ years.

We took two tours while in Sydney. The first, a tour of the famous Opera House, was really interesting. We learned a bit about the contentious process of getting it built, as well as about the building and its primary theaters. We even got to see a bit of rehearsal of a large chorus of schoolchildren singing "Ease on Down the Road" from the musical The Wiz. On our last night, we joined Shana's friend and her husband in seeing a play called Chalkface in one of the smaller theaters in the Opera House.

Secondly, we took a tour to the Blue Mountains, which are probably beautiful, but because of fog/rain we really saw very little. We did get a brief "opening" in the clouds at a lookout called "Boar's Head" to get this shot:

As you can see from the photo below, we could not see anything more than about 50 feet away. It was more like the "white mountains" or as if there were no mountains.

At an earlier stop on the tour, however, we had a great time seeing and interacting with some Australian wildlife, including kangaroos who love both their food, and the wafer ice cream cone the animal park sells it in:

Koalas (very lazy):

Wombats:

And, amazingly cute little penguins (that is literally what the species is called). These penguins don't need cold temperatures to live, and are quite happy in the oceans around Australia:

Finally, we did find a bar in Sydney where we were able to watch a bit of the baseball playoffs, which we were watching in the late morning/early afternoon the next day. 

We left Sydney by car to drive to the country's capital, Canberra. We will then fly to Melbourne. 

Ciao,

Jeff and Shana

Second Stop -- Singapore

We stopped in Singapore to break up the trip to Australia. Who wants to take two flights totalling nearly 20 hours all at once? A stopover after a 12 hour flight was a great solution as Singapore is a fabulous destination. 

Singapore is a city-state that sits at the end of the Malaysian Peninsula, just 80 or so miles north of the equator. It has a large, important port, and sits in a key economically strategic point at the end of the Strait of Malacca (through which tons of goods, most importantly oil, pass). In recent years, Singapore has made itself into one of the most important finance hubs in Asia. The city itself is beautiful:

Yes, that is the view from the pool at our hotel -- on the 35th floor.

There are so many interesting things about Singapore. Unfortunately, I am sure that I will miss some key ones, but I will try to do it justice. First, Singapore is a country of rules and rule followers. There is virtually no crime in Singapore. There is not even any nuisance type issues: no littering, no graffiti, definitely no public urination (there are free, accessible bathrooms everywhere, and they are universally clean). And, even though we don't think it was mandatory, only suggested, every single person wore a mask on public transportation. Seriously, we did not see one person without a mask during our numerous rides (of course the system is extremely efficient and easy to use).

Second, Singapore is a multi-cultural society. Essentially, Singapore was settled by people from China, the Malay Peninsula and India, and it was a British colony from 1867, thus there are people from all over. This multiculturalism can be seen in the fact that Singapore has four official languages: Malay, Mandarin, Tamil and English.

Multi-culturalism also extends to religion, with large numbers of Christians, Buddhists, Muslims and Hindus. As far as we could see, freedom of religion is respected and all of the major religions are treated equally. For example, Singapore has ten official holidays: two secular (Singapore Day and Labor Day), three Christian/Western, two Muslim, one Hindu, one Buddhist, and the Chinese New Year. Amazing. The religious diversity is also reflected in the beautiful places of worship, as can be seen below.

We visited our first ever Chinese Temple, which was impressive, but you were not allowed to take pictures of the area with the representation of the Gods, which were amazing,  so this picture hardly does it justice:

There are several Hindu temples, this one was particularly ornate:

When we visited Little India (and saw this temple), preperations were on for the Hindu festival of Lights,  Deepavali (or Diwali), and the entire area had a festive feel as everyone prepared for the holiday.

Although we had visited a number of Buddhist temples in Thailand, this one was impressively large and had spectacular statues of Buddha:

Finally, there are many Mosques in Singapore, but this one was the most photo-worthy:

Of course, there are also plenty of churches, but none as impressive as the ones in Europe, so why take pictures?

One other aspect of Singapore's multi-culturalism is the food. The food is fantastic, and you can eat really good food incredibly cheaply. We ate amazing Chinese, Thai, Japanese and Indian food while never paying above $70 for a meal. Of course, there are also many European options along with super high-end/Michelin-starred restaurants, but we can get those at home/we had no need to spend the money when there were so many good, cheap options. 

A hawker center is an outdoor food court with many options for good, cheap food. Most of the places serve only a limited number of things, but there are options for everyone. There was a center near our hotel, that has a number of fantastic satay booths outside it. On our first night we ventured out there. Basically, right at 7 pm, the street is transformed from a traffic artery to a place where hundreds of people come to eat. After figuring out the system with the help of a couple of guys from New Zealand and South Africa (but lived in Hong Kong and now Bangkok), we lined up to order/collect our food, bought beers and grabbed a table. The satay (sold by the stick) was delicious:

Another very cool food experience we had was trying Chinese Hot Pot. Hot Pot is a soup that you make yourself. You get one or more soup bases that are kept bubbling at your table, along with different kind of meats/fish/veggies that you cook in the soup. Then, there is a buffet of various condiments that each person can add to their own soup making it a bit different from everyone else at the table. It took a bit of instruction from the very-helpful waitstaff at the restaurant, but we got the hang of it by the end.

So what did we actually do in Singapore besides eat? There are many attractions that are artificial and manufactured -- not our thing. Just walking around town with its giant skyscrapers, and fantastic architecture is an adventure in itself, but as for activities, we were selective.

We went to Gardens by the Bay, which are a series of domes/locations with various outdoor-type experiences (remember, we said things were a bit artificial). The first had flowers and plants from around the world, with a special focus on, ironically, southern Spain, including reproductions of Andalusian patios, which we have seen in real life.

The second was kind of an interior forest with an opportunity to experience what it is like at the top of a rainforest.

In the Cloud Dome we even encoutered a Chihuly piece:

After that we did two days of outdoor stuff. We did the Southern Ridges walk through a series of parks, which showed how much greenery Singapore has for a large city with many skyscrapers.

We visited the city's Botanical Garden, which were huge and contained many types of plant life along with sculptures and a very strange (for us) device: an mini automatic lawnmower, a number of which were silently working away in some of the lawns.

Although we did not see either a monkey or one of the local river otters (much to Shana's chagrin), we did see a number of these large, handsome lizards:

We visited the Singapore National Museum. We enjoyed learning about how although there is limited information about a trading post existing in the 14th and 15th centuries, Singapore's history really begins in 1819, when the British East India Company arrived and set up a trading port with the agreement of the Johor Sultane. By 1867, Singapore was a British Crown Colony, which it remained until it was conquered by the Japanese in 1942. After the war, Singapore was returned to Britain, but there was agitation for independence, which led to partial self rule in 1955 and then full self rule in 1959. In 1963, the city attached itself to Malaysia, but only two years later, for reasons that the museum glossed over, but appear to include economics and race, Singapore separated from Malaysia and because a truly independent country on August 9, 1965. We thought the museum, which was in a beautiful old colonial building, was well done if a bit whitewashed (e.g., it mentions various riots by Chinese citizens without really going into the issues or what happened).

On our last night in Singapore, we returned to The Gardens by the Bay area to watch a free concert of (coincidently) Spanish music, followed by the nightly light/music show, which was impressive:

We enjoyed Singapore a lot -- it is a very interesting society that has many things going for it even if it seems a bit Disneyfied at times.

Now, on to rainy Sydney.

Until next week,

Jeff and Shana