Got on the train about noon at the Regent station and arrived at Flinders Street Station at about 12:20 and as Curt lives right across the street (handy) I was in front of his building by 12:25. I had a tour of his building and apartment and then we were off….walking the cute narrow lanes lined with shops and cafes and bustling people.
Building in a building
Flinders Station
He took me to the place where he works, the GPO (the General Post Office) http://www.melbournesgpo.com/about/ building that, like many many heritage buildings in Melbourne, have been turned into something else….shops and offices. He works for Cocao http://www.cacao.com.au/ Many of the beautiful old buildings in Melbourne are called arcades because they have been converted into malls with lots little shops, you can use them to go from one street or lane to another. Now on some of the old buildings they are leaving the old street facing wall and putting in new insides.
I tried to find a couple of caches down there but the tall buildings and narrow lanes, just have the GPS signals bouncing all over the place making it hard to settle it down to GZ (plus I think I was embarrassing Curt by poking about benches and things!)
We also went to the ACMI (Australian centre for Moving Image) in Federation Square to see a display by author illustrator, Shaun Tan. It was about taking his picture book, The Lost Thing, from book to animated feature www.acmi.net.au/shauntan. We didn’t stay to see the feature, but I will come back next week to do that.
We met up with Natasha after her classes , she took us on a tour of her classrooms at RMIT http://www.rmit.edu.au/ where she is studying art and design. Then went out to dinner to a very busy Korean restaurant…..very yummy.
They walked me back to the train station to catch the train home. It was busy as one of the soccer/footie games had just let out. As I was sitting waiting a young man with headphones on started dancing….not singing , not asking for anything….just dancing. He got on the same train as I, in the car behind. But he kept right on dancing……he kept the people smiling and even a couple of people joined in…….he was still dancing when I got off at Regent station 20 minutes later!!!!!
Saturday Aug. 10.
Saturday was sunny when I finally got out of bed…..I’m reading The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith aka JK Rowling so it kept me in bed longer than usual. In the afternoon I went exploring “my” neighbourhood……I’m trying to get used to the cars driving on the “wrong” side of the road and as a pedestrian trying to look right then left before I step off the curb and not get myself killed!!! I walked up to Edwardes Lake Park for a couple of caches. Then walked by through the little community of Reservoir where the shops are. I don’t know why they think this is still winter there are so many flowers blooming everwhere already.
Curt and Natasha came later in the afternoon armed with more veggies to cook me a delicious dinner of veggies and chicken, spiced with a mild curry served over rice. We spent the evening chatting and watching my pictures of my trips from 2012.…..they were very patient watching them all of them….they didn’t fall asleep anyway!
Sunday Aug.11
They did spend the night and Curt cooked a late brunch for Natasha and I…..I really like this making up for all the Birthdays and Mother’s Days that he has missed….I like to be catered to!
After cleaning up we took the car out for the first time. This time Natasha driving and I sat behind in the passenger seat, again trying to get the feel of driving on the left side of the road and mimicking the shifting of the gears and using the clutch as she drove (wonderfully by the way). (For those who don’t know I have never learned to drive a manual car….big mistake being lazy like that…so I have taken 4 driving lessons Shifting Gears Driving School http://www.defensivedrivingschool.ca/ (with a manual car. It seems most of the rest of the world uses manual cars. Last year I couldn’t use the cars at the exchanges in Germany and France because I couldn’t drive them!!!) I will practise around the block later this week !
We drove up to CERES http://www.ceres.org.au/home.html at Energy Park…it has a community garden, a nursery, a market, community bike shop, café and playground….oh and a cache! After that we went to Fitzroy and had a bite to eat and a little walk to see the shops. We got back to the house and chatted for a bit and then Curt and Natasha hopped the train back to town.
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