Melbourne

Jenny and I both agreed that the best stop/port/whatever you want to call it on our vacation was Melbourne.  I could live there for the rest of my life and have no qualms about it.  What an absolutely gorgeous city.  Wide, clean streets with awesome colonial/Victorian style architecture in the downtown area, a seemingly endless supply of good restaurants and bars, shopping, and tourist attractions, and some of the nicest people we met on our travels made Melbourne a fantastic place to visit.

We spend the first part of the morning at the Queen Victoria Market, which is like five football fields of covered swap meet/outlet store stuff.  Neat to look around, with an enormous produce section that made me envious.

I loved this sign so much I had to get a picture of it.  So simplistic, and so true – you can’t get enough of it.  Jenny did not understand my fascination with this sign.

 Jenny thought this was hilarious, probably because, in Japan, it’s hard to find clothing that is larger than a child’s medium-ish on her.

The afternoon was Jenny’s treat – a chocolate tour of downtown Melbourne that took you through most of the high-end chocolate stores in the area.  We started at Lindt, and then worked our way over to Haigh’s chocolate.  Our guide was a wonderful woman named Carol who probably has the best job in the world – take tourist to chocolate stores and bring out massive trays of free samples.  Ok, she’s not a fighter pilot, so second best job in the world.  Anybody who is interested in this kind of tour and will be in Melbourne check out their tours at: www.chocoholictours.com.au

 

  

  

 

 Dark chocolate, milk chocolate, and the round ones were Champagne Truffles and were easily the best ones there.

Then we walked up to another chocolate store/café called Koko Black where we had MORE chocolate and some chocolate-themed drinks.  Jenny and I actually got sick of chocolate, which you would think would be physically impossible, but oh no, it is.  After the three hours of chocolate, we decided to wander through downtown Melbourne to try to walk off some of the caloric assault we had just launched on our bodies.

 

  

  

 

On our way back to the ship, we got to see a lot of the old architecture that the Melbourne residents have been really careful to preserve.  At the same time, we ducked down one alley and found a tour guide giving a group of tourists a walking tour of the graffiti walls downtown as well.  The alley was covered on its entire length with some pretty awesome graffiti, but kind of like curling isn’t a sport, I have a hard time calling graffiti “art.”  Not that I could do it, but the mental image I have of “art” doesn’t equal a painting on the side of a bar wall in an alley.  But then again, maybe I’m just an art snob.

 

 

The graffiti walking tour o’ justice. 

This awesome Episcopal church right in the middle of downtown Melbourne.  There was a wedding going on, and Jenny and I surmised that, since it is summer in December in Australia, December weddings in Australia are like the June wedding sin America.  The bride was DECKED OUT.

Once we were finally tuckered out, we hopped back on the train and headed back to the ship.  We had dinner reservations at the steakhouse on the ship, one of the things that we always insist on doing because the steaks on the Princess cruise ships are usually amazing, and these didn’t disappoint.  I am so glad I married a carnivore, because the Ribeye picture below is hers.  I get hungry just looking at it.