Feb 28. Melbourne

It's was an early start to the day with a trip to the airport by cab and then a Virgin Australia flight to Melbourne. This is a local flight and was full of football fans heading into town for a big game.

It was about an hour in the air and we flew over coast line and some of the country we would see on the way back. From the air it was hard to see any evidence of the fires that had raged in the previous months.

We got into the airport just before noon, picked up our bags and took a cab nto the Radisson Hotel. The front desk staff suggested we walk up to the Queen Victoria Market as there were lots of good food opportunities there. Great idea. It's less than a 3 minute walk and well worth a visit.

There are several acres of covered vendors with all sorts of items for sale from great looking fruit and veg to prepared meats, clothing, jewellery trinkets etc. But we came for food. 

We followed a big group of school kids past a lot of vendors down to the back of the facility and came across a few food gems in an alley. 

This was a wonderful curry lunch we both enjoyed. 

We set off to explore Melbourne a bit. It certainty looks to be growing rapidly judging by the new high rise buildings going up. Very interesting mix of the old and the new however the city feels "grittier" than Sydney.

A lot more graffiti and buildings needing repair. Certainly more cameras and police presence than we had seen. It may be a reflection of the area we were in but we'll see when we travel further.

The city has a wonderful bike lane system with lots of bikes (and ebikes) around. You have to watch carefully when crossing the street.

We met up with Tom and Shirley for a beer at Little Billy's pub to trade travel stories. After wandering around a bit more, we went back to the hotel and decided to stay in for supper and watch a movie on TV. 

Using Google maps we located a bottle shop about two minutes away (got two bottles of wine) and then ordered a pizza from the Royal Standard Hotel which was about a 5 minute walk away. Jim went to pick it up and chatted with one of the owners. It turns out to be a busy little place with the pub doing a booming dine in and take away business. Excellent pizza at a great price.

The owner observed that I was not local and when she found out I was from Canada she gave me a thumbs up and said "we're the same" meaning Aussies and Canadians. They appreciated our coming to visit.