Settling In

Flinders Street Railway Station

Hello! So apologies to any of you who've been checking the site regularly for the length of time between blog posts, we've just been caught up in the boring everyday stuff that moving half way around the world entails. We've been in Melbourne almost a month now though and we're starting to feel a bit more settled in so we thought we'd share with you a bit about life in the world's most liveable city (according to the economist anyway).

The most noticeable difference to home is of course the climate. The weather has actually been varied, we've had plenty of cloud and the odd heavy downpour and impressive lightening storm amongst the sunshine but it's definitely hotter than England! Weather is prone to fluctuation on a daily basis so we don't feel too far from home even if hayfever in November was a new phenomenon for Mat. Average temperatures range from the high teens to low thirties meaning that during sunny spells (like the last week) it's common to be wearing jeans in the morning but avoiding going outside by midday!

The city itself is indeed very liveable, it's busy, but in a friendlier and less frantic way than the likes of London. It's clean, the streets are lined with trees and the tram system adds a fun element to the public transport system. The demographic is extremely multicultural, walking down the street you see just as many Asian faces as white ones and there are  substantial Greek and Italian districts too offering a vast array of nice looking places to eat out. Many of the side streets of the city centre also brim with fun little coffee shops and cafés which we're hoping to check out once our funds allow.

A café filled side street

Coffee is a very big thing in Melbourne and standards are very high for prospective baristas which has made job hunting in the café sector much more challenging than in the UK! As far as jobs go; after an unsuccessful trial at a local café to which I never got called back, I managed to get a job working in a new store in the central shopping complex. It sells quirky, novelty gifts and is quite cool but unfortunately isn't providing enough hours so I'll be looking for something to supplement/ replace it after the Christmas rush is over. Mat's still looking, after initially trying to avoid too long a commute or late finishes anything is now under consideration (though with an official barista course on how to prepare fancy coffees now under his belt hopefully his chances are improved)!

Melbourne central shopping centre,
built around an old (gun) shot factory

Life here seems much more expensive than it is at home as the average wage is much higher so our savings won't stretch quite as far as we'd first hoped and we're on a tight budget at the moment. That's nothing that 50 hours or so a week between us won't fix but it's limiting what we can buy and do at the moment so we're holding out hope of better times to come!

Still, we've found a nice place to live in a house-share about 10 minutes walk from the central business district which is far nicer (and a bit cheaper) than being in a hostel but I believe Mat's going to post on that in a bit more detail soon so I won't go giving it all away now!

Okay, enough chat for now!

Keep us up to date with how things are there,

Leah x

Quick Notice

It should now be easier to comment on our posts as I have fiddled with the access settings. Test it out and let us know how things are going over there. Also, check out the new posts below.

Cheers

Mat

Rain and Rocks

Guess what? We're in Melbourne! Sorry it's taken us so long to post but we thought that now we're here we should update you on what we've been up to in the last week.

When we last wrote we were in Perth and it was raining. Well the weather didn't improve much whilst we were there! We were hoping for a week of sunshine and beach life but intermittent showers and strong winds meant that we were in jumpers for a lot of the time. Cottesloe beach resort (where we were staying) was about 45mins from the city centre leaving us with little to do but fight the winds and walk along the coast. We did stumble across The Naked Fig cafe though where we were served nice coffee and even nicer cakes! (See pic - it was good enough to draw us back on another wet day). When we did make it into the city we sorted out our bank accounts before taking ourselves for a walking tour around the Western Australia capital. Whilst there wasn't much in the way of things to do on a tight budget, a definite highlight was King's Park. This gave brilliant views of the city as well as being an open air botanical garden complete with a 'tree-top walk'. We were even lucky enough to spot a Kookaburra in the wild!

From Perth we flew to Alice Springs for a flying visit to the Outback. We weren't expecting much from the city itself and thought that 2 nights would give us plenty of time to visit Uluru (Ayers Rock), however we were met with friendly, accommodating locals as well as pleasantly hot temperatures (32-36º). The landscape was surprisingly green (owing to unusually high levels of rainfall in the last 18 months) which provided a striking contrast to the vibrant red/orange of the rock and blue of the sky. It turns out that we left wishing that we'd had longer to explore more of the area and soak up the uniquely Australian setting. Our only full day was spent partaking in an 18 hour tour (billed as Australia's longest single-day tour) which took us to the famous Uluru and neighbouring Kata Tjuta (a striking rock formation of deep valleys and steep sided gorges otherwise known as the Olgas). This was undoubtedly the best day that we've had so far, despite the early start and high cost we were rewarded with a rich cultural experience, fantastic views and a champagne dinner at sunset! We discovered so much more about Uluru than it is possible to see from the front of a post-card, from the aboriginal teachings shared by our guides to the magnificent intricacies and undulations that simply have to be seen by the naked eye.

Anyway, that's enough for now. We'll keep you posted on how the job/flat hunting goes and remember to let us know how you're doing and what's going on back in the UK.

Lots of love

Leah and Mat

P.s. We're now 11 hours ahead of the UK in case you wanted to chat (e-mail us if you want our Aussie numbers).

Into the Outback

                                                                                   Rock Wallaby

A salt lake en-route to Uluru

The Olgas (Kata Tjuta)

Now at Uluru

Postcards from Perth

 

So Long Singapore

We've made it down under! We're currently sat in our room (hiding from the rain of all things!) at Cottesloe beach, Perth. Haven't seen much of the area yet, after only arriving last night and suffering from severe jetlag!

Singapore was very different to our expectations. Far from being a little Asian city thriving with eastern culture our general impression was of a great affluence giving rise to great extravagance. It wasn't until we got the metro to Chinatown and "little India" that we saw anything other than high-rise hotels/banks (our 20 storey hotel was smaller than average) and massive glass-fronted shopping-malls. Still, nothing was more impressive than the marina bay sands development, a hotel/shopping complex featuring designer stores, an ice-rink and an indoor river (complete with waterfall and rowing boats), flanked by the 'skypark' topped hotel towers and the floating Louis Vuitton glass pyramid. From here we went on to Raffles hotel, part of the old British influence and home of the long bar where the original Singapore Sling was created. The building was grand, cocktails brilliant but fish and chips disappointingly sweet!

Whirlwind tour of Singapore over, hopefully the Perth weather will improve as the beach here looks gorgeous. Hope all's well in the northern hemisphere, Leah and Mat x

Another Quick Airport Message

Hey everyone. Sorry for no earlier update but we've struggled to find internet in Singapore. We're now at the airport en-route to Perth so should be there by this afternoon! We'll let you know when we're there and we'll also post about our time in Singapore.

Hope everyone's doing ok.

Leah & Mat
X

Airport Living

Heya, just incase anyone's seen the news about Quantas over the weekend I thought I'd update you. We did have our flight cancelled but subsequently it has been reinstated and as such we are due to depart for Singapore in the next few hours. We have been warned that delays are probable but ther is no news yet so we are all checked in and are just playing the waiting game... If all goes to plan then we will be up in the air just after 11.00am.

Will let you know when we get there!!!

Mat
X

p.s. If anyone tried to contact Leah yesterday after about 11am, then your message hasn't reached her as that phone number is now out of action. If you'd like to speak to her then feel free to contact my phone and I'll pass you over.

T Minus 5 Days, 16 Hours, 15 Minutes and 22 Seconds... (provided the flight's on time!)

Ahhhhh! OK, so it’s now under a week till we leave the UK so we thought it was a good time to launch our blog.

Just in case you don’t know what we’re up to, here’s a quick run down of our plan. We’re leaving from Heathrow on the 1^st of November, flying out to Singapore before we head on to Perth, Uluru and Melbourne. We will visit Sydney and the Barrier reef (stopping along the east coast as we go) before we depart for New Zealand in July next year! We have three weeks in NZ after which we will be on our way home – making a short stopover in Hong Kong en-route.

We’ll use The Fat Wombat to let you know how we’re doing and what we’re up to so make sure you check it regularly! You can also write comments and messages below each of our posts to let us know what you think or just to keep us updated on what’s going on wherever you are.

Wish us luck and we’ll let you know when we get to Singapore!!

Lots of love,

Leah and Mat