Melbourne Heat Wave

Let's face it, anything over 26' is hot - but you have 5 days of over 30' days - it's just madness. 

Denby Beach - Brighton

Last day before we go back to work tmr and fortunately, it turned out to be a lovely day so we drove to Brighton to enjoy the sun, sand and surf. 

Good bye 2013!

Looking forward to the experiences, challenges and excitement that 2014 will bring.

Happy New Years everyone.

Boxing Day 2013

I should be blogging about Christmas Day but instead - a short picture update about Boxing Day BBQ (done from leftovers from the Christmas Day lunch BBQ).

Snags, prawns which I had marinated with mango and chili flakes and chicken drumsticks which I had marinated with a blended mix that consist of coconut, onions, curry powder, lemon grass and tamarind.

An easy peasy dinner!

Sneak peek - adventures in my back yard

Can you see what I see?

The hunt for the perfect burger

I have been on a crusade of sorts since around last year. You see, I tend to cook a lot of Asian style food at home so on occasion, I do tend to like going out for something different and it always inevitably ends up being something Western. As I am not a steak lover and BF is, we came to a compromise and ended up going for burgers instead.

Thus started out hunt for the perfect burger.

BF is quite fussy with food as it is, so on our recent US trip, we tried the local fast food place called 'Jack in the Box' and he has been hooked ever since. When we got back home - every burger was being compared to JiTB but it looks like he has found a good replacement at Andrew's Burgers in Albert Park.

The menu wasn't extensive, and there are limited places to eat in so most patrons end up eating at a small grass plot across the burger joint (us included). Also be prepared for a wait - we were told ours would be 20 mins so we nipped across the road for a drink to kill time.

All in all though - worth the wait. :)

Andrew's Burgers
144 Bridport St
Albert Park VIC

I want to ride my bicycle ...Queen

In my quest to lead a somewhat healthy lifestyle in between the work, and the travel and the what's-so-not, I have started doing some evening routine.
It is still a WIP at this point - power walking or cycling. Quite pleased with myself today 11km's.
If only it actually becomes more of a habit rather than a chore. :)

Weekend fun activities.

The weather was too good on Sat for us to not take advantage off. So what do we do, strawberry picking!

We headed down to the nearest farm to us which turns out to be in Keilor. 1/2 hr later and we are picking and dipping (as BF says, 1 for the basket, 2 for me). Bonus was - it is also the only organic strawberry farm in VIC so we def were eating healthy.

Lovely fresh picked sun kissed warm strawberries... Mmmm...

**Melbourne ** Night Out

A bit behind on publishing some of my blog entries but no matter, it is not like anyone reads this anyways..!

Being in a relationship has its pros and cons, and one of the cons is being so "content" and not really needing to "pick up" any longer *hey, lets be honest here - we tend to go out to check out the meat market, when you are no longer in the scene, it just feels like a bum deal coz you can watch but cant touch!* - lol..

Anyways, I digress.
On 1 of the Saturday nights that we did decide to slap on some war paint and head out, it was to the European Bier Cafe on Collins. Nice selection of European beers off the tap and bottle of course - brought me back to being back in Belgium 2 years ago.

Food wise - it was ok, typical pub grub with some Australian flair - I stuck to the Caesar salad hence no pics but decided to take pics of some of the others instead.


Chicken parma and chips.

Pork chop with crackle - the crackle looked too thick.

Not being a beer drinker, I opted for a strawberry and lime cider :)

And finished it off with a round of squashed frogs shooters- they barmaid really was hopeless at mixing a cocktail tho - a proper squashed frog shooter is suppose to be nicely layered but these came out DEAD! Oh well, still tasted ok tho.

European Bier Cafe -120 Exhibition Street Melbourne VIC 3000

To top the night off, it was to Max Brenner for coffee/mocha and dessert.

Max Brenner Melbourne Central Shop - OE5, Menzies Alley, Melbourne Central Shopping Centre 300 La Trobe Street Melbourne VIC 3000

Hot Melbourne

What do you do when the weather turns red hot?

Put on the barbeque and have a nice cold cider/beer.

And how did you spend the Australia Day break?

Mine was at the Australian Open 2011 watching the men's quarterfinals (Novak Djokovic def Tomas Berdych in 3 sets) courtesy of a good friend who had 4 corporate tickets.

Aren't I a lucky girl?

Playing tourist VIC - Docklands

One of the advantages of my work is being able to see or go to places that sometimes you just don't get too much of a chance for.

Now ... I know that Docklands is in the CBD but how often do you get to get these views while you are at work? Too bad that it was for a few days but it was still a refreshing change.

Playing tourist VIC - Graffiti

Art or menace - ??

I have always liked and admired graffiti around Melbourne -not all mind you, just the ones with the artistic flair and if I have my camera with me, it is snap snap snap away much to the amusement and sometimes exasperation of BF.

Yes, I know that the Melbourne City Council think that graffiti is a nuisance and an eyesore but it does add character to an otherwise "blah wall". Each to their own I guess.

These ones were taken around Fitzroy after a nice catchup with some mates who were visiting from Sydney.

Talking fish...

AAAGGGHH *scary growl*

Hmmm....

Playing tourist VIC - Berry picking.

One of the things that I have decided to do this yr (which reminds me, I still haven't blogged about my resolutions!) is to start enjoying the lil things in life - and hopefully with less pain to the hip pocket as well! This of course includes doing things around Victoria. Don't get me wrong - "travel without the passport is not travel" is still my motto but doing this around does keep things interesting.

BF has been going on and on about berry picking for yonks and seeing that it was in season and the weather was kind to us yday (a nice 19' as opposed to the massive 35' on Sat!), we took a drive up to the Dandenong Ranges for a bout of berry picking! Yes, very domesticated but sometimes it is all about the lil things.

There are actually a few farms up the Silvan area that caters for "U-pick" but after a bit of research, we opted to go to Blue Hills Berries and Cherries as it had blackberries in season. Some of the other places had raspberries, blueberries and strawberries but if BF wants blackberries, blackberries it is!

The road trip itself took us around 1 hr from where we lived - not a biggee really even if our trusty Garmin ran out of juice 15 mins away from our destination and stuck someplace near Ringwood. Never fear, that's when the trusty 3G capable phone and Google maps came in handy *phew*.

To cut the whole story short, berry picking is great fun! Have of the appeal is being able to pick and eat immediately and nothing beats a self-picked fruit. Am even considering going again in a few weeks...

Road trip drive to Silvan

Yummy blackberries!

Yes, I picked those.. don't they look good?

Hunting for the best strawberries..

Our final haul - all 2.5kg's of strawberries, blackberries, raspberries and some boysenberries...

Little pleasures

Brunch with a good mate on your day off...

APTE Cafe - Alphington

Pics taken using my camera phone

Camera stories - Melbourne Central

Playing tourist VIC - Tesselaar Tulip Festival

Well I haven't been blogging as I have been too busy - BUSY PLAYING TOURIST!!
Lol, the problem with living someplace is that we tend to get lazy and go with the usual phrase " I'll do it next time, it is not going to run away". Unfortunately, that is not true. Seasons change, ppl change, heck, there might be a mishap * touch wood* and where does that leave us? Regrets.

I have decided that I will not take life for granted, I WILL go and try new things, I WILL go and DO new stuff ~ however mundane, trivial or silly ~ it is all for fun. After all, I am not getting younger by the day.

As such, after years of putting it off - this year Mel and I played tourist and headed to the annual tulip festival in Silvan, VIC. It runs for around 4 weeks and this yr it was on September 16th to October 17th 2010. There is a cover of $18 (Concession $15, Under 16 free). There is usually a theme run to go with the week and when we went it was the Irish Week!

The trip itself was gorgeous as Silvan is on the foot of the Dandenong ranges so it is green, leafy and calming. Silvan itself is well known for its nurseries and fruit farms so I did enjoy my mini road trip.

Will leave with pics till the next playing tourist series :)

Falls Creek, VIC *Fun Trip* - Sept 2010

After all of the stress at work, we (BF & I and 2 mates) decided to do a weekend away and catch the last bits of snow for this season.

With the recent spate of rain (and the recent road closure due to floods), things could have been quite dicey if it wasn't for the very gorgeous *unexpected* weather over the weekend.

Not to say that there wasn't much drama involved. The drive Friday evening was marred somewhat at Mt Beauty. We were on a 4WD and seeing that we were staying overnight, needed alpine fuel in order to not get diesel freeze up. Getting there at 8pm - all of the service stations *yes, all 2 of em* were SHUT! OMG! On a Friday night! During school holiday times! We weren't the only ones stranded there however, there were 3 other groups also contemplating where to go. After some investigations, we had to traipse back to Bright that added another 1 1/2 hrs our trip, so by 1030pm, you had 4 very tired and very grumpy travellers.

It was all well worth it though, the next day turned out simply lovely. And we decided not to rush, took it easy and - well, will let the pictures speak for itself.

All pics taken from my Nokia phone hence the low quality.

Australian Interest Rates and me...

The thing about living in Australia is that - it is the great Australian Dream to own your own home. Its the mentality of "why should I pay for someone else's mortgage when I can pay my own". But then again, BF had this mentality as well so perhaps its a Caucasian thing. It is not normal in Asia to own your own property until you are well in your 30's whereelse over here, you see ppl as young as 21 getting onto the property ladder, something that still amazes me as lets be honest, at 21, I was still in uni and definitely not equipped with the tools to manage my own money ..what else thinking of getting into such a big debt to my name. Saying that though, the Gen-Y's and Gen-X's in Australia are complaining that it is getting harder to get onto the market. The median house price is Melbourne is currently around $500,000 and gets more expensive as you get closer to the CBD. I currently live 18km's from the CBD and this is actually considered close considering that any suburb within 90km's from the CBD is still considered Melbourne these days.

Yes, buying a home is no piece of cake in Melbourne.

The Australian property market unlike the other developed countries namely US and UK had a slight property dip in late 2008, early 2009 before it picked up again and then just went from strength to strength. It is the only country where the interest rate never went down lower than 2% and the official RBA rate is currently is at 4.5% and the Bank rates is anywhere between 6.5% to 7.2%! Talk about being slugged and there are talks of at least 3 to 4 more rate hikes within the next few months. On top of that, we've got really exorbitant stamp duty taxes (both Govt and state) on top. *Ouch*!

I mean, living in the city, buying OR renting really means you have the smaller apartment or less space (unless of course you are right loaded which means there would not be a problem buying into the property market in the 1st place!). At the end of the day, it is a lifestyle choice.

More on my chain of thoughts when it comes to property buying later.

Updates ...

I feel guilty sometimes that I don't spend time to blog more often.

Don't get me wrong, I use the Net enough for work purposes, and I also read other peoples blog and I often wonder " Where do they find the time????"

Maybe it is all about priorities?

Anyways, moving on - things have been pretty hectic social wise for me, with working full time, my quiet weekends are now filled with catching up with friends and "date nights" as BF and I try to find quality time and catch up on what is going on with work and all that. Its been good actually. Friday nights are usually reserved for date nights, it is usually dinner and a movie but yesterday was going out with some friends to catch Russell Peters and then some drinks at Richmond - its nice to be living in Melbourne, even if I am living in the 'burbs... hehehe.

Last weekend was a blurry haze, went for dinner at a mate's - she has a lovely 2 bedder apartment in Southbank and we later adjourned to Collingwood, and the 2 boys basically polished off a bottle of Small Batch in an hr and a half! Good fun with great company - but this will have to stop at some point.. or does it? :)

Haven't been taking too many pics these days, a small clutch does not make a handy camera keeper so on the few occasions when I do, I take snaps of food! Doesn't help that BF is no cam-whore ... the pics above was taken from the Meat & Wine Co, in Southbank before we headed for a mate's bday in the city.

Anyways, just thought I'll get something before old age strikes me and I forget! Happy Weekend!

p/s: I started this entry on Wed and only finished today..lol