Happy Valentines Day! I remembered when I was standing on the railway station at Sunshine this morning, and wished my husband the same.
We had already been up to the Taylor Lakes Shopping Centre at Sydenham, to Big 4 Vision to have them repair Chris’s glasses. This turned out to be a far more simple exercise than we had expected; we were sure that one of the lens had been scratched when it fell on to the concrete floor. Cleaning and polish with fancy products and it was as good as new, and we were pleased the repair had not become a long drawn out business of having the lens remade.
On arriving in the city we headed at once for the free tourist bus which wends its way across to the sports precinct which includes the Rod Laver Arena and the Melbourne Cricket Ground, then up past Carlton Gardens and the Royal Exhibition Centre. There was an excellent recorded commentary that drew out attention to many of the interesting and / or beautiful attractions out the windows, and the bus driver interjected frequently, exhibiting his own sense of humour.
As we passed by China Town, we were informed that there was an excellent museum here, well worth visiting. It houses the largest parade dragon in the world! Well, really? I thought Bendigo had laid claim to that? I do believe that we will have to take all these claims for the largest, the oldest, the best…. all with a grain of salt.
Chris and I left the bus outside the Queen Victoria Market and walked around this wonderful landmark attraction which covers seven hectares making it the largest open air market in the Southern Hemisphere. It has been operating since the 1850s; however the wholesale activity was moved to Footscray after unrest which ended up with a few old fashioned murders in the 1960’s. In the 1990s piracy of brands was a real problem and that has apparently been cleaned up as well. Unlike the Paddy’s Market in Sydney, this is spacious and pleasurable to wander through even if one tends to be a little claustrophobic. We purchased a couple of shirts for Chris and one parsnip but nothing more because our cash had run out and EFTPOS machines were not immediately obvious.
We wandered down William Street and found a shady wall in Flagstaff Gardens, from where one could once upon a time enjoy great views over the harbour. That was long before the buildings obscured any such possibility, however it was a pleasant place to pause and rest from the heat of the day.
From here we walked on down to Docklands which is entirely different from when Chris was last here. In fact the development of this harbourside area is all quite recent. In 1996 construction of the Dockland’s Stadium was started, and completed four years later. Today it is known as the Etihad Stadium, after its current sponsors, and holds over 50,000 people. It is mainly used for Aussie Rules games but has hosted cricket, soccer and a variety of other sports.
Development of the surrounding areas now includes great apartment and office blocks, restaurants and the Harbour Town Shopping Centre. There were many other tourists such as ourselves, wandering about the precinct, admiring the artworks along the waterfront and evidence of so much commercial enterprise.
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| The Yarra River |
We walked for some distance in the hot sun, and then caught another of the free tourist buses further along the set route. The bus took us south over the Yarra River and along through the art precinct of Southbank, before winding around the Botanic Gardens. We left the bus again outside the Art Gallery hoping to catch the current exhibition, however today is Tuesday, and Tuesday is the one day along with Christmas Day, the gallery is closed. We will return another day. It wasn’t too far from there back across the Yarra River to the Flinders Street Railway Station.
Before heading home we popped into McDonalds and enjoyed a cold ice-cream cone, enjoyed the Valentines activity in the street; a rather strange looking woman selling single red roses and couples taking romantic horse drawn carriage rides. We decided to visit the Information Centre and came away with another armful of brochures. Amongst these were some informative tracts about Federation Square. I was aware that my description of the architecture of the Square had been less than brilliant yesterday and thought I could remedy it here, with some help from the literature. From the waffle I did glean that the cladding is sandstone, zinc (perforated and solid) and glass. Apart from that the descriptions are so new-age and airy-fairy, I could not bear to repeat it here. We did decide today that on second viewing, the buildings about the Square are quite attractive after all.
We also did something more to express our confidence and appreciation of this beautiful city; we have booked and paid for a further two weeks here in this caravan park out here at Rockbank.
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