sf 2 oz

Upon arriving in Melbourne for the Australian Open we quickly realized that people here don't watch tennis, they watch "the" tennis.

Well, we really enjoyed the tennis. I was actually surprised at how exciting it was to see such a high caliber of players battle it out on the court. The first day we had tickets to Rod Laver arena and watched some highly ranked players like Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray...we also got a peek of the Williams sisters playing doubles! The second day we bought grounds passes for $20 each and ended up seeing some great tennis PLUS Roger Federer warming up. It was also a fun atmosphere with beer gardens, live music and sponsor tents everywhere. This whole experience is making me want to see Wimbledon..hmmm.

A lot of our Sydney friends were actually in Melbourne as well - some for tennis and some for other stuff. We had fun during the evenings going to dinner and bars. We even got to celebrate Jess' Dirty 30 at Coda Bar + Grill followed by karaoke in Chinatown (which I think the girls enjoyed more than the guys).

The last day we were in Melbourne was Australia Day, which appears to be a day off from work for people to be patriotic, BBQ, go to the beach and do other Aussie things. Officially it commemorates the first explorers to arrive at Sydney Cove in 1788, the hoisting of the British flag there, and the proclamation of British sovereignty over the eastern seaboard of Australia. We didn't really have a typical Australia Day as we were busy exploring a few other parts of Melbourne including St. Kilda and Chapel Street. Oh well, 4th of July is still better!

I've had my share of long-ish stints without seeing my parents or being home, but never before had it reached a period of 8 months! Needless to say, I'd been looking forward to their visit to Sydney. They stayed for about 10 days and we had a lot of fun showing them what we love about this city, sharing meals and even traveling to the Blue Mountains and Jervis Bay. Some highlights include:

• A fabulous sail boat ride on Sydney Harbour in perfect weather..it was even hot enough that we all went swimming off the side of the boat!
• We were also fortunate to experience the St. George Open Air Cinema. It was incredible...never seen anything like it. It's an outdoor movie theatre that's positioned on the waterfront right by Ms. Macquarie's chair. We watched Invictus, though sometimes it was hard to concentrate given the the city, Opera House and Harbour Bridge were on either side of the screen!
• After being in the Blue Mountains for a day and night in pure fog (we couldn't even see the 3 Sisters or mountains), we stopped at a wildlife sanctuary called Featherdale that my mom had learned about from a friend. We were able to get SO close to koalas, kangaroos, kookaburras, tasmanian devils and other Australian wildlife. I'd highly recommend it, especially going later in the day after all the tour buses have cleared out.
• Unfortunately we didn't get great weather in Jervis Bay either, but still had fun exploring a new area together. I think one of our favorite parts was where we had dinner on the last night. Called The Gunyah, it's basically a tree house located at a luxury tent camp - Paperbark Camp. We ate outside on the deck among the trees and possums (one came dangerously close to jumping on our table, eek!). A really unique experience.

Here's some photos from our time together. We're looking forward to hosting Mike's parents next!

On Boxing Day after watching the start of the Sydney to Hobart sailing race, we hopped on a plane to Hobart, Tasmania (better than traveling 4-5 days at sea!). We'd been looking forward to this trip for a while, so it was great to land and begin exploring a new place. We had the evening in Hobart to walk around and have dinner before heading off the next day up the east coast to the Freycinet Peninsula.

I had reserved a campsite right on Richardson's Beach in Freycinet National Park, which I felt really lucky to get given the campsites are given away via a ballot system for the Christmas/New Year period. We set up camp and enjoyed some local Tassie beer - Moo Brew - on the beach. Mike grilled some steaks/mushrooms/onions for dinner and then we watched the sunset by our tent.

The next day we went on a 12km hike to Wineglass Bay and Hazards Beach. Hazards Beach was empty and the water crystal turquoise blue - it was paradise. We walked the length of the beach in awe at the lack of people during the 'busiest' time of year for tourism in Tasmania. We went down to check out the campsites at the end of the beach and after not much discussion decided this was where we wanted to spend our thrid night.

After returning to our campsite at Richardson's Beach, we jumped in the ocean and then took (cold) showers. We decided to drive up the coast because we did not want to miss seeing the little penguins in Bicheno and the beer drinking pig at Pub in the Paddock in Pyengana - both came highly recommended.

It was a lot of driving for one evening, but so worth it. Feeding the pigs - Priscilla and Priscilla Babe (the younger one) - was hysterical. Priscialla even burped after she slurped the beer down! We did learn that the pig beers are mostly water with a little beer for taste. After eating some pork sausages at the bar (why order anything else?) we headed back down the coast to Bicheno for a 10pm tour to see the little penguins. They come out of the ocean when it gets dark to a grassy area with various burrows to feed their young and sleep. We saw hundreds of the little guys - it was really neat.

The next day we packed up our campsite and put together a few backpacks with gear for our night at Hazards Beach. We arrived after a few hours of hiking (thanks to Mike for carrying the big pack!) and got the prime tent spot. We spent the afternoon swimming, watching the wildlife and walking around. At dusk there were wallabies hopping around and one was pretty bold and got really close to us. It was an increcible camping experience..one we'll never forget.

We ended our trip in Hobart, which was a lot of fun given all the activity on the waterfront from the Sydney to Hobart race. We walked around looking at all the big racing boats and even got to welcome a handful of finishers! The Taste Festival was also going on so we had fun trying local food while sitting outside under the almost full moon on our last night. Hands down, I think it was definitely the best time of year to be in Hobart with all the race activity, food/wine and warm weather.

Tasmania is so pristine..as with the other places we've been, I'd love to see more and wish we could have stayed longer.

Christmas was quite different for both of us this year, but it's one we'll never forget. The hot weather, fireworks, artificial trees, santa hats, seafood lunches and pavlova were all part of our Australian Christmas (aka Chrissy) experience. I must say that we had to work harder to get into the holiday spirit (which usually comes VERY naturally for me), but we made it special with our tree, some decorations and Christmas Eve/Morning plans.

On Christmas Eve we went to dinner at Quay, which is in a spectacular location on the edge of Circular Quay with floor to ceiling views of the Harbour Bridge and Opera House. We enjoyed a nice long gourmet dinner and then headed over to St. Mary's Cathedral for midnight mass. It was standing room only when we arrived at about 11:15. Despite being a bit warm and uncomfortable, it was a beautiful setting for a Christmas Eve service. After leaving the church at about 1:30 in the morning we were suprised to see ice cream trucks outside! So funny..it just couldn't be more different than to what we're accustomed.

We slept in on Christmas morning, had a lazy breakfast, opened pressies and spoke to our families on Skype. We were planning for hot sunny weather, but it actually wasn't really a beach day. We ended up running down to Bondi to check out the scene, which was essentially tons of backpackers wearing santa hats. That evening Chris and Jess had us over for a BBQ at their place in Woollahra. We ate lots of yummy food including pavlova, a meringue dessert topped with cream and fruit that's very popular here. It was nice to close off the day with good friends, food and drink.

Thanks Australia for a unique Christmas, although I'm already looking forward to sitting by the fire and drinking hot cider in the Northern Hemisphere next year!

Last weekend Alane and Mickey hosted a Thanksgiving feast for a group of about 15! They live in the Horizon apartments in Darlinghurst where the view is incredible (we'll be heading there to take in some fireworks on NYE). They cooked a turkey and everyone else brought various holiday specialties. I made a pumpkin pie with filling that Mike smuggled here from the US in October. We also brought green beans and a few bottles of wine. It was a fabulous fabulous feast..just look at the picture of my plate! Yum. Even though we couldn't be with family, we are very thankful to have such wonderful friends in Sydney!

Yesterday we got our real tree delivered from http://sydneychristmastrees.com/, where I ordered it online. Upon delivery I was quite happy to learn it's a Monterey Pine. A little slice of home in Oz! Most people here in Australia seem to do the artificial trees, which I guess makes sense given the heat. But, being the traditionalist I am I was pretty adamant about getting a real tree. We had to cut a decent amount of branches off the bottom to get it standing up in our el cheapo tree stand -- which, by the way, I had to go on quite a mission to find. Can you believe that K-Mart, Target nor Big W (like Walmart) have tree stands? Next step is to find some more ornaments!