Donna Hay's

I had no plan to get any cook books on my recent trip to Melbourne, but on one visit to a bookstore on the last day we were there, I ended up buying two cook books by Donna Hay, an Australian author of many best selling cook books. Both books have recipes that I could use and some pictures that are definitely attractive. Of course, I'd like to get more books.... but.....

Her recipes from Fast, Fresh and Simple can be found here.

Along The Great Ocean Road....

When we were in Melbourne, we decided to drive along the famous Great Ocean Road up to Apollo Bay. We planned to have lunch in Apollo Bay and drove back after that. It looked cloudy in the morning and the temperature was a bit low, but as we went along, the blue sky appeared and the weather turned great. We made a few stops along the way to take some pictures and admire the scene.  The distance between Melbourne and Apollo Bay is around 187km. Not so bad for a day trip! We had fun!

Melbourne Bike Share

Melbourne has a bicycle sharing system. You can rent these bikes and ride them in the city. Just make sure you have a helmet with you or buy one for $5 from any participating stores. Quite handy, I must say.

Christmas Lunch In The Plane

On our flight the day before Christmas to Melbourne, we were offered one lunch after taking off and a smaller meal prior to landing in the evening. The starter was Tian of Alaskan King Crab and Mango with  mesclun and Singapore dressing (above). We had four options for lunch and I picked Christmas Roasted Turkey. I could have picked beef, vermicelli soup or lamb, but I was trying to stay away from red meat and vermicelli soup did not sound inviting to me. It was my third day in a row having turkey! Oh, well. I ate a bit just to fill my stomach, as I knew my day would be long.

Dessert was either Dark Chocolate Ice Cream or Christmas Log Cake  and I picked the Cake because it had a better presentaton. (!) It made nicer picture! I only tasted a bit, I was too full and too tired. I was already napping when they offered cheese and crackers and other goodies.

Hosier Lane, Melbourne

We stumbled across Hosier Lane when we were going to walk along Yarra River from our hotel. The walls along this small alley are painted with work of arts. Reportedly they change quite often too. This is one of the places that many people come to see in Melbourne.

Beachcomber St. Kilda Lunch

Going to St. Kilda, we were aware that there were many restaurants around to choose from.  We planned on checking out either an Indian or a Thai restaurant there, but somehow we ended up eating at a Cafe (a big one!) located along the beach that we passed by when we strolled along, called Beachcomber St. Kilda Cafe. I have just read the reviews by Tripadvisor and realized how bad the overall service has been for many people in the recent times. I can't completely disagree with what they wrote. Have I read the reviews prior to coming there, I would have not decided to agree on dining there. Anyway, here are the pictures of the over-priced food that tasted just average or below, that we had. The only good thing about it was the location.

At St. Kilda, Melbourne

The day  after Christmas, the five of us took a Maxi Cab to St. Kilda. We started our sightseeing tour from near Luna Park, strolled along the beach (away from the sands!), had our lunch in one of the Cafes there, back to the Park again and walked along the streets nearby. We stopped by to droll over the cakes and pastries displays on the window and picked up some stuff from a couple of stores nearby. In the afternoon, we took tram back to near our hotel and alighted at the area where the shops were. Jam-packed with people!!!

On Christmas Day, From Our Window

View of Yarra River in Melbourne.

Nobu Dessert Bento Box, Melbourne

The day before we left Melbourne, we had lunch at the well known Nobu. I guess, we just had to try it to know whether their food is something that we like or not. These pictures here are the pictures of their Dessert Bento that we had after we finished our meal. It's our first time there and we wanted to try a little bit of everything. For such a high price, the desserts were just okay.

Flying Home...

Holiday came to an end and it's time to say "So Long!" to Melbourne! We packed our belongings and flew home last night. The face of Melbourne changed quite a bit over the past years and I am sorry to have to say that I like the city more in the past than the present. The changes in the demography of the city have changed the friendliness and the beauty of the place. The strength of the currency makes everything more expensive and less interesting. Having said that, I still had my getaway from home and it is always great to have an occasional break from our routines, from time to time. More importantly,  the five of us were together as a family and experienced all the goods, the bads, the frights, the fights, the laughs and so much more. We are also proud to have prevented ourselves from being cheated by an Indian money changer who tried to take away A$300 from us, in the form of 12.5% commission fee that he created by himself for himself. What a jerk! The last jerk we saw in 2012. 

Goodbye 2012, we are waiting for the arrival of new year in less than three hours.....

I try to make myself comfortable in the plane during a rather long flight, this one included. I put on the slippers from the hotel and sipped up some Solitaire Dreams served by a nice Flight Attendant of Singapore Airlines.

Queen Victoria Market

It was the day after Boxing Day and it was our plan to check out Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne. It a within walking distance from the hotel where we stayed.

Boxing Day

It's Boxing Day and our intention was to stay as far away from the shops as possible, we had no plan to go the malls and try to get good bargains. Let other people have them! We went to St. Kilda beach instead. Absolutely not to swim! It's windy and too cold for us and many people. We strolled along trying to enjoy the scenery and took some pictures. That's all. And had lunch. And did a bit of window shoppings.

Christmas In Melbourne!

Merry Christmas from Melbourne! A view of Yarra river on Christmas day. Peace on earth and good health to everyone and their loved ones!

Chicken Katsu Curry

There are many Japanese restaurant around where we stayed, when we were in Sydney. Unlike Japanese restaurants here in Singapore which employ mostly locals, we noticed that the waiters and servers were mostly Japanese. We went to one located in the basement of World Square one night to have dinner and I got to enjoy Chicken Katsu Curry that I used to love and back am loving it again recently. This is one of the better ones that I have tasted.

Mamak!

It has become a habit for me to check what to eat and where, before I travel to some places. This time was the same, Sydney and searching for great places to eat. I came across Mamak at Haymarket as a hot restaurant that serves Malaysian food. There are good reviews all over the internet and I put the name down as one of the places that we should consider.

One evening, upon returning from Blue Mountains, we saw a long line outside a restaurant which turned out to be Mamak. It is merely two blocks away from we stayed and it opened on Christmas day. Twas the day we tried. DH tried to beat the crowd by lining up before the opening time at 11:30, he was there around 10 minutes before and was the fourth in the line. Once opened, people stared to flow in and filled in the place. By the time we finished, a line was already formed.

We ordered the classic Roti Canai (right at he very top picture), A$5, way higher than the price we can get here in Singapore or Malaysia at $0.80, of course. It's delicious and well made, we all loved it. We tried their Chicken curry too, it was A$15. We had a couple of Fried Chicken , at $3.50 each (picture above) and Kangkong Belacan - A$13 -(Water spinach with shrimp paste) below. We also had their Murtabak (A$10.5) and Chicken Satay (A$8 for 6 pieces).

We were really stuffed but we felt obliged (silly!) to try their dessert, Cendol, A$5. It was great too. There were other mouth watering dishes that we wished we could have tried as well, too bad, we did not have any larger stomach capacity. We could only imagine how yummy they could be. Hmmmmh..........

Completing ...

When one takes a trip to Sydney, visiting the Sydney Opera House, in some way, is almost a must. It is for us. On Christmas day, after a morning light shower, the day turned super lovely, the sky was so blue and tons of people headed to the Opera House as most other places that people would go to, were closed. A guitarist that we found playing his musical instrument on Pitt street on other days, also moved to the Opera House area, trying to make money there. It was our second visit to the area on this trip, the place looks as great as always.

Late Lunch At Eastbank

We had a late lunch at Eastbank Restaurant on our way to the Sydney Opera House, on our second day in Sydney. The restaurant was merely five minutes away from the Opera House. The restaurant was rather quiet when we were there, because it was already really late afternoon. Our starter was thin bread served with three types of dips. I loved every single dip, including the olive one that nobody else in my company, liked.

We had Angus beef, linguine pasta, beef-battered fish and chips. They portion was too big for us that we had no space for the mouth watering desserts that they had. Too bad.

Tree Cycling In The Rocks

This Christmas tree is found in the Rocks, Sydney. It is made from the recycled parts of up to 100 bicycles.

Canberra Visit...

We rented a car and revisited the capital city, Canberra. It took us around three hours to go there and another three to come back to Sydney. Yes, the whole day was gone. We went to the usual spots, the above is the Parliament House and below is the War Memorial, taken from afar and from inside.