Impressions of Melbourne

Last Friday night we went to the Crowded House concert in Melbourne -- which is essentially where that band began. I must say from the beginning I was struck by the contrast of Melbourne versus Sydney. Sydney seems to me a bit dull. The architecture (aside from the Opera House) is 'blah'. I haven't really seen the arts district, if Sydney even has one. To be fair, the parks are nice. By far the biggest contrast was the public transport. Sydney could really stand to learn something from Melbourne here. Melbourne's public transport system is top-notch. During the week, there is a train every 10 minutes; on weekends, every 20 minutes -- even out to the suburbs. Compare this to Sydney, where during the week, the train runs every 30-40 minutes during peak hours and every hour during off-peak; and every hour on weekends. Not to mention Sydney nickels-and-dimes riders for every little distance they go -- but in Melbourne, it's only two zones of fare distinction. Melbourne also allows riders to pay for a full route (as much as you can ride on the train, tram, and buses) during a 2-hour window (this fare is A$5.30).

The city architecture is complete eye candy. Everywhere, it's obvious that the city was built with an emphasis on design. Very few of the buildings are traditional-looking and dull. All creative elements were used: color, shape, texture, and an assortment of mediums (concrete, wood, glass, steel, plastic). I've never taken so many photos of buildings before.

There is a great variety of shops and restaurants. We enjoyed several used books stores, a neat game shop (where we found a Scrabble game done with playing cards instead of the traditional board), tons of cafes and coffee houses, and the obvious assortment of traditional retail. The people are also quite friendly and helpful. I think the food highlight of our trip was the Mexican restaurant we found, called Taco Bill's. It wasn't as good as some of our old favorites in Dallas, but still quite decent. After that we went to the James Squire Brewery and I downed a sampling of six different beers (porter, amber, india ale, red, pilsner, and pale ale).

We stayed at the apartment of some friends we met at Jen's wedding in Brisbane -- Chris and Iris. The funny thing was that at the last minute, Iris' job had her going to Sydney on Friday, and Chris decided to go as well to catch up with some of his old friends. We got to have a wonderful evening with both of them Thursday, though, and will be seeing them again over the holidays. Like Brisbane, we found Melbourne very welcoming and definitely plan to travel there again. So far, it's my favorite city in Australia; however, I did really miss the beaches, cockatoos, and the escarpment near our home.