The Weekend: Sunday at The Dandenongs

I am still looking for work so I have been out and about this week. I've been using the car to go around our local suburbs on little missions. And, as Mark has been stuck indoors working, I thought it would be good for us to get out of town today to see a bit of what Victoria state has to offer. Yesterday was Brighton Beach (see previous post), today was The Dandenongs - just our local rainforest. We did, what for me was, an epic walk. My Fitbit reports a 2hr walk, of 5 miles and 'up' 89 floors' - basically not that far but with plenty of hill action. 

It was a bright but cool day, perfect for walking. It is difficult to show on the iPhone the colours and the light but trust us, it was absolutely perfect. Lots of eucalyptus ...

and clearings where kangaroos and wombats lurk at twilight. 

This was the home stretch with the sun throwing long shadows through the trees. Happiness. And we burned off the chips at lunch no probs!

Geographically interested. Well it was here (below). About 50 mins drive from our place.

The Weekend: Saturday at Brighton Beach

One of those things that people say to us is 'you must go to Brighton beach'. So we did. It's just down from St Kilda where we were last week and it was just good to explore the surrounding area a bit. It's a pretty ritzy area although strangely, we didn't find any nice places to eat there. The coloured beach huts are a tourist attraction as you can see - lots of folks taking the same photo in front of the one painted as an Australian flag.  

Like these idiots below. 

If you just take a short walk past the photo opportunity it's actually a really lovely beach with lots of other pretty beach huts.

If you are wondering where we were see below. 

El Diablo

We are finally mobile, no longer constrained by the boundaries of the Melbourne public transport system and in the words of the Soup Dragons, we're free to do what we want, any old time.

Drum roll please ladies and gentlemen...

...we give you El Diablo!!

She doesn't run on petrol, she runs on Fire and Brimstone and she's got 1.6 litres of fury under the bonnet, soon to be released on the sleepy and unsuspecting roads of Australia, leaving a trail of ruin and pain in her wake.

Be afraid, be very afraid...

Gumtree

As you know we are scratching about trying to furnish our new house at the moment and I thought we would just give you a little taster (for those of you not on Facebook) of the things that are being offered for free on Gumtree in our locale.

They say beggars can't be choosers but I don't think we'll be taking up the offers.

Anzac Day

For those of you who, like us, didn't know 25th April was Anzac Day. Originally it was a day to commemorate the landing of tens of thousands of Australian and New Zealand troops at Gallipoli (Turkey). More recently, it is a day to commemorate servicemen and women past and present. 

It's a big day in the Australian calendar so it is a bank holiday.  Mark took the day off so that we could join in the ceremony at the Shrine of Remembrance in the centre of town. It was a very moving experience with people of all ages in attendance. We got there just in time to see the last of the bands walk from Flinders Street to the Shrine and followed them all the way. It was quite a walk for those more elderly servicemen and women. 

I did take several videos which capture some of the tremendous wall of sound that hits you as a band marches past but sadly the blog will not permit me to put it up due to its size. Needless to say it was a tremendously solemn procession and we both felt humbled to be able to observe a day that is not widely acknowledged in the UK. 

We didn't take the picture above but it did look as bright and beautiful on the day we went.