Melbourne - the adventure begins

Hee hee, I'm finally posting on my Melbourne adventures.  At this stage, I've been here three weeks followed by a week in Kaikoura for work and I'm back again.  

BM and I are living downtown in an AirBnB one bed apartment for three months and city centre living has been fun so far.  I wondered if I would find the noise off putting but I like being in the heart of things.  Melbourne is a lot more multi-cultural than New Zealand (and it goes without saying, Ireland).  The city centre has a strong Asian population which has translated into a growing addiction to bubble tea as its so easily available.


Both BM and I are here to work, so our adventures are restricted to the evenings and weekends.  

The apartment is lovingly decorated from Ikea and I'm rather taken by the decor.  Bright, spacious and functional.  Perfect for two but entertaining is more of a problem.  We have a poker night on tonight and the living room is full to bursting with 7 people ...


The kitchen is small but serviceable.  Though the lack of good knives was driving BM slowly insane.  I brought back one from NZ on my brief travel through our house on the way back.  We even have a dishwasher!


Proof of our downtown location!  That's the extent of our out door space but its nice to be able to open the door to the outside and have some fresh air circulate.


I love the feel of the apartment - neutrally decorated with splashes of colour - enough to have some interest.



Our bathroom even has a bath!


The landlord lives in the same building and has been both hands off and helpful when we needed it.  

We've been visiting a few of the restaurants and bars within walking distance - the boilermaker house was a delight on the first night.


I work near Melbourne Central and was surprised to see the clock play Waltzing Matilda on the hour - I don't know how the staff in the nearby shops can stand it!


So what I have learnt about Melbourne?


An abundance of donuts (short stop).


The meetups are friendly - Melbourne Alternative Crafters


There's lots of places offering massages at relatively cheap prices (compared with walkins in Wellington)


There seems to be a festival on every weekend...


So far we've stumbled on the Chinese New Year (first weekend)


Complete with firecrackers and dragons.


White Night: and I do mean stumble (as we had no clue any of these were on but you can't miss them where we live)


Lots of street performers and projections on key buildings.


State Library above.


The image above was my favourite from the night as it just the shape of the building to play against.  I loved the dystopian waterfall.

Greek festival - we live close to the traditional Greek quarter (minus most of the Greeks from what I can tell).



The down town seems to buzz at night - I love seeing the Asian signs (I'm assuming Chinese but as I can't read them...)


The abundance of restaurants are hard to resist!

This restaurant is close to our apartment (unfortunately the decor out paces the food!)



Interesting decorating choices in a local shopping centre.


And that's me out of steam for the evening...




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