We Can't Take That Stuff to Canada: Australia

Sydney
We arrived in Sydney after a long flight from Seoul via Kuala Lumpur on Asia's equivalent of Easyjet, AirAsia. It was so cheap that we weren't even allowed into the real Kuala Lumpur airport and had to stop at the one that is mainly used for air freight. It had a palm tree through.
Sydney itself is a very in your face city, the harbour is stunning with amazing views of the famous opera house and harbour bridge. We met up briefly with my mam's cousin and her family who live in the suburbs of the city in Rozelle. Their house was lovely and I can see how the quality of life there would be appealing, with the nice big balcony and pool at the end of of the street. We had really good fish and chips the first night we were there near where were staying in Elizabeth Bay, which made a welcome change from all the noodles we'd been eating in Korea and Japan. We also bought the ingredients to cook a full English breakfast which I'd been craving for a couples of weeks.

Our first full day in Sydney started with a full English. Although we couldn't find the cutlery in the flat so we had to eat it with our camping sporks. As we had tickets to the Australia v England T20 Game at the Olympic Stadium, we headed down there in the early afternoon to see the Olympic park. We watched the Women's game first which was the last game of the women's ashes. England Ladies had already won the Ashes on the points system they use for the women's competition and we thought we might be in with a chance of seeing at least one England victory on the day. Unfortunately the Aussies won, although we did see England get presented with the ashes trophy. The men's game doesn't really deserve much of a mention other than there was pyrotechnics, people on trampolines and some circus performers balancing on big balls. The Olympic park had a cool fountain made from the original Olympic torch from the 2000 games and all the medalist a were commemorated in stones around the fountain.

Olympic Stadium

Olympic torch fountain

England ladies

Pyrotechnics

Defeat

The next day we got the ferry to Manly and spent the day on the beach, swimming in the sea and had good beer at the Four Pines brewery.

Sea dragon

Beach where we swam

It rained on our last day in Sydney so we had a quick trip to Watsons bay and had fish and chips again. Then back in the centre we sheltered from the weather in the art gallery and then had more good Australian beer at the Local Taphouse pub.

Cliffs at Watsons bay

More cliffs

Overall Sydney seemed like a nice city, it felt a bit like central London in that there were a lot of things geared up for tourists with lots of nice things to look at but it didn't really feel like a place I'd want to live. I thought it lacked a bit of character and felt a bit superficial. But Rose disagreed with me and said she could happily live there so I'm probably talking rubbish!

Famous Opera Bar

We flew the Melbourne the following morning and after dropping our stuff off at the Airbnb we were staying in went out for an amazing Turkish banquet. We ordered far too much food as we'd missed lunch due to the flight and both ended up stuffed so we had an early night after a quick pint at the local pub the Penny Black.
On our first day in Melbourne we caught the tram to the town centre and then went on the tour of the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). The tour was carried out by a volunteer called Eric who was at least 75 but it was very interesting even if he did make a few jokes at England's expense. I was disappointed there was no sport on while we were there as it is an incredible venue and it must be amazing when it's full. Afterwards, as it was so hot, we went to the botanic gardens and lay around under a tree reading our books.

MCG

Botanic gardens

Sunset

Sunset with Rose

The next day we got the tram to St Kilda which is on the coast and had a walk around, had some good coffee and food. After St Kilda we went to the Mountain Goat brewery in Richmond which is only open two nights a week. The beer they have there is pretty special and is easily the best I've had all trip. The Rye IPA was the pick but they had a Saison (which was a trial recipe for a collaboration they are doing with Brooklyn) that was served after being passed over pink peppercorns and lemongrass was pretty good (sounds pretentious and you'd be right). The bar is pretty cool as well as you're sat next to the main brewing plant. We had good pizza there as well.

St Kilda

Mountain goat brewery

Bar

Brewery building

Houses

Yarn bombed trees

On our last day we went to Fitzroy to the Rose Street Market which was cool, Rose really liked it! We had good food at a place called Grace which had homemade lemonade. We then spent most of the afternoon reading under a tree in the park near Melbourne museum as it was 41 degrees and we didn't really want to wander around. We had tea at the Little Creatures brewery dining hall which was little bit disappointing. We stopped off at the Ale House Project on the way back to our room and had a couple of better beers.

Little Creatures Brewery Dining Hall

Old Hotel

I definitely preferred Melbourne to Sydney as it felt more like a real city with lots of different stuff going on and it was little less touristy. I also really liked the architecture and all the street art.
The following day we hired a car and drove down the Great Ocean Road to a campsite next to the Cumberland River (couldn't resist!). The campsite was amazing and it was only a 2 minute walk from the beach. It was really nice to get away from towns and cities after nearly 6 weeks of travelling and be able to relax. There's not a lot more to say really about our last couple of days in Australia, it's easier if I just put up pictures of the scenery.