Australian Footy

During our visit we're fortunate to be catching the tail end of Australian Football League (AFL) season. I'd never heard of Australian Football, but Brandon had confusedly worked his way through a TV broadcasted game in the States and really wanted to see it in person. We watched the AFL semifinals on TV with our host last week which was super helpful in understanding the game. To me, it seems like a combination of football, soccer, rugby, and more. Here are some basics: 


Terminology: 

• "Footy" = Australian Football
• A "mark" = a clean catch of a kicked ball that has traveled over 15 meters 
• Allows the player who catches it to release the ball again without bodily interference for a few seconds 
• "High" = an illegal high tackle above the shoulders
• "Back" = a player is pushed in the back, an illegal tackle

Field and game set up: 

• Leagues first began in 1896 
• The game is 4 quarters of 20 minutes each 
• The ball looks like an American football and can be kicked, thrown, or bounced 
• The field is an oval shape with four posts on each side of the field
• Getting the ball between the two center posts is 6 points
• Getting the ball between the outer posts is 1 point ("we give one point for trying" as our host puts it!) 
• No blood allowed on the field
• Many players have bandages hiding blood 
• From a physical therapy standpoint, there seem to be a lot of injuries as there is no padding in the uniform or helmets 

http://www.brec.org/index.cfm/page/2518/n/276

Our host is a hardcore Hawthorn (a Melbourne team) fan, so we rooted for them during the semifinal against Fremantle (a Western Australia team) or risk being thrown out of our Airbnb. Hawthorn won and we'll be watching them in the AFL final against West Coast on Saturday. The final is being held at the Melbourne Cricket Grounds (MCG), so there will be parades and all sorts of festivities in the city. 

Watching the West Coast Eagles vs. North Melbourne Kangaroos Semifinal with Isis. West Coast won and will be playing the Hawthorn Hawks

It is near impossible to get tickets to the AFL final, not to mention financially unfeasible. But, we were able to get tickets to the Victorian Football League (VFL) finals at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne last Sunday. The VFL is a minor league, and we were excited to find that tickets were just $20 AUD each. It was a very worthwhile experience! As it was a final, both teams, Boxhill and Williamstown, were neck and neck until the 4th quarter when Williamstown pulled far ahead. The stadium wasn't very full, so we were able to move to a new seating area and vantage point each quarter. So much fun! 

Teams lined up before start of the game

Classic tackle and pile up trying to wrestle the ball away

Unlike soccer, the players all stay pretty grouped together

Defending the goalposts as the ball gets near

During half time, the kids get to play mini games of footy on the field

We had so much fun at the footy! 

For those interested in learning more, here's a video further explaining footy: 

( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMZYZcoAcU0 )

Northern Craft Beer Festival

Sometimes one event leads to several others. This happened to us recently as we met a bartender on our first day in Melbourne who led us to both a taco restaurant and a craft beer festival...crazy! We purchased tickets to the Northern Craft Beer Festival online and found our way to the Pentridge Prison where it was located. Yes, it was located in the D block of an old prison. Kinda of a cool venue, but mostly creepy. 

Yes, it's a beer festival at a prison

The venue plays up the creepiness by retaining all the barbed wire and prison gates

There were around twenty different craft brewers and a few food stations lined up through the cell block and exercise yard. We're used to paying admission to beer festivals that gets you a set amount of tokens for drinks. That was not the case here. There were some free samples, but overall you were encouraged to purchase "stubbies" or "pots" of beer. We hadn't brought cash. Oops. Kinda awkward. But, we made the best of the free samples and enjoyed conversation with a few brewers. We were particularly interested in hop varieties, as Australia has access to some different hops than we're used to. 

 Craft brewers set up all along prison block D

Here's a few things we learned: 

• Stubby/stubbies = 375 ml short neck bottle of beer 
• Pot = 285 ml (10 fl oz) of beer  
• Galaxy = a popular hop from Tasmania that is very floral and fruity with a delicious smell
• Helga & Vic Secret = Other Australian hops
• Australia is fairly new to the craft beer scene...most of the brewers had been in business less than two years. 
• Many people in the craft brew scene seemed familiar with Founders Brewing in Grand Rapids, giving us a lot of street cred

Brandon with a sample of taco beer brewed with lime and coriander from Two Birds Brewery! 

Overall we learned that we should be very thankful for the relatively cheap and easy access we have to great beer in the States. If you'll permit us to be beer snobs for a moment...The beer we've had thus far in Australia has not nearly matched the quality and variety we've grown accustomed to living in the craft brew powerhouse of Michigan. But speaking to people at the festival it seems Australian brewers are definitely headed in the right direction. 

Australian Taco Feast

As most of you know, I love tacos. I'm always craving them. I'm always up for trying new places. Well our world was shattered a little bit when we were told by the barkeep we met the other day who had been Stateside that there really wasn't as good of Mexican food places in Australia as there are back in the States. We too had noticed that there weren't as many Mexican restaurants around. Sadness...

But luckily the same barkeep had tried a few places around the area and recommended a place called Maya Tequila Bar & Grill. But he said the one downside is that the food can be kind of pricey, which is quite unfortunate given that one of the perks of tacos is that they're usually both delicious and cheap. Again sadness...

But again thanks to our new barkeep friend, he recommended looking on Groupon for finding good deals to this location. And boy he was spot-on. We found a deal for All-You-Can-Eat Tacos for just $9 a person. WIN!!! 

The instructions for redeeming our taco feast were a little bit strange. They wanted us to sign up for a time slot via their website, but it wasn't clear whether we were making a reservation or what because it said we were being put on a waiting list. We would have tried to just call and ask them directly, but they're only open for dinner and the reviews said that they aren't the types that usually answer their phone. But given that we have nothing but time on our hands right now we thought we'd just show up for the time slot we thought we signed up for and worst case they'd turn us away and maybe explain how to properly make a reservation. Luckily that wasn't necessary, we got there early enough they just sat us straight away once they finally opened their doors. It probably also helped it was a Tuesday.

It took a little bit for the chaos of the doors first opening to settle down. But once our waitress came, she was very accommodating. She explained the terms of the Groupon deal once we pointed it out. Basically we had up to 2 hours to eat as many tacos as we liked. They had six kinds: chicken, brisket, pork, fish, quinoa, and tofu. (You can see the other toppings on those tacos and the rest of their menu by clicking here.) Each order came as pairs of the kind you ordered. So of course we first ordered one of every kind. Our orders were then delivered to us 2 plates (4 tacos) at a time. Our first set was even delivered within 5 minutes of ordering them.

The chicken tacos and the brisket tacos 

The fish tacos and the pork tacos

Me in taco heaven with the tofu tacos and quinoa tacos.
Also displayed is our Veracruz mocktail... delicious! 

So before it was even time to order a second round of our favorites, Katie and I had had 6 tacos each. And all of the kinds were good. We were most surprised by the tofu tacos cuz usually those are nothing to write home about. Katie was quite full with her 6. But I had to take more advantage of our great taco feast, so I ordered two more plates: tofu and chicken. This brought my total to 10 tacos for the night. I feel like I could have ate more if I was willing to be miserable, but it didn't seem worth it. And even though I'm sitting here writing this blog post a few hours later and feeling I could eat a taco right now, I still feel like I made the right choice.

And that was the night of our Australian Taco Feast. I'd say it was quite a success. 

Bonus pic: Evil/Crazy Taco Brandon

Meet some of our Melbourne housemates

One of the perks of where we are currently staying in Melbourne is that this house comes with some pretty awesome housemates. Meet three of our favorites so far: Isis, Loki, and Oreo. That's right, we have 3 very friendly cats as housemates. 

Left to right: Isis, Loki, Oreo

Most of the time all three cats just do there own thing, as cats so often do, not including us humans in their leisurely activities. But usually a couple times a day each cat will grace us with some attention. 

Oreo hangs out in our room sometimes. For instance this morning she was meowing outside our room, so I let her in and she cuddled up on my lap as I petted her. She also sometimes likes to hide under our bed or in our closet. We have to do our best to keep the closet door shut so that we can avoid any surprises in the middle of the night.

Oreo the cuddle bug.

Loki is the friendliest of the bunch, but he especially tends to be our best friend whenever we're cooking. There is a stool he'll jump up on to make sure we see him, so we put it in the center of the kitchen so he's amidst the activity but out of the way. But if he gets too crazy we have to sadly put him outside so we can actually finish cooking. Loki so far has been Katie's favorite, I think due to his kitchen-side companionship. 

Loki in his usual spot whenever we're cooking.

And then there's Isis. Quite the name, eh? Our host said she named her before the terrorist group existed. But the correlation in name does add some humor to our time here. Before we left my mom being the worrying but protective type wanted to make sure we were of aware of some of the more prevalent dangers going in the world. The main one being the activities of ISIS. I reassured her we were well aware of that group as well as other traveling dangers and that the likelihood of running into ISIS or any other problems given the places we were traveling was so small that it was not worth worrying about. Ironically I was wrong. We did meet Isis... the cat. Luckily Isis the cat has no malicious intent as far we know. She is the most independent of the cats, but she will still let us pet her on occasion. 

The surprisingly friendly face of Isis.

The Price Is Right Australia

In honor of my brother's Price is Right post from his Alaska Arctic Researcher blog, I have decided to do a Price is Right Australia version. See if you can guess the price of the following items. Then scroll all the way down the post to see the answers. No cheating! 

Organic shampoo (400 ml or 14.1 oz) 

Sundried tomato strips (280 g or 9.9 oz)

Basil pesto (190 g or 6.7 oz)

Hazelnut spread (generic Nutella) (750 g or 26.5 oz)

Peanut butter (500 g or 17.6 oz)

White long grain rice (2 kg or 4.4 lb)

Watermelon (1.18 kg or 2.6 lb)

Strawberries (250 g or 8.8 oz)

Skim milk (1 L or 0.26 gallon)

Greek yogurt (1 kg or 2.2 lb)

Shredded cheese (700 g or 24.7 oz)

Chicken breasts (1.133 kg or 2.5 lb) with prices hidden by receipts

 

Eggs (dozen)

Scroll down to see how your guesses compare to the real prices! 
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It's hard to accurately determine the USD prices of these items as ratio of cost of living to salary plays a huge role in economy. In addition, exchange rates are always fluctuating. We are fortunate to be traveling at a time when USD is stronger than AUD, but a short time ago that would not have been the case. I listed AUD and USD prices for each item with exchange rate of $1.00 AUD = $0.70 USD. 


Organic shampoo: $3.50 AUD = $2.46 USD
-interestingly, organic was cheaper than non-organic in this case

Sundried tomato strips: $3.53 AUD = $2.48 USD

Basil pesto: $2.70 AUD = $1.90 USD

Hazelnut spread: $6.93 AUD = $4.87 USD

Peanut butter: $4.00 AUD on sale = $2.81 USD

White long grain rice: $3.00 AUD = $2.11 USD 

Watermelon: $1.50/kg AUD = $0.48/lb USD

Strawberries: $1.70 AUD = $1.19 USD
-smaller than the quart sized package I'm used to

Skim milk: $0.90 AUD = $0.63 USD

Greek yogurt: $5.50 AUD = $3.86 USD
-eating Tasmanian yogurt feels exotic to me

Shredded cheese: $6.50 AUD = $4.57 USD

Chicken breasts: $9.00/kg AUD = $2.88/lb USD

Eggs: $2.99 AUD = $2.10 USD

Australian Dictionary: In the Grocery Store

We've noticed a few differences in Australian English versus American English in the last few days, especially in the grocery store: 

• Rocket = arugula 

• Capsicum = bell pepper 

• Fairy floss = cotton candy

• Porridge = oatmeal

• Chocolate buttons = chocolate chips

• Rockmelon = cantaloupe 

• Sultanas = raisins 

Sultana bran and chocolate buttons

Baking in Australia

It's only day three for us in Melbourne, but I've been itching to bake something to satisfy my sweet tooth. Of course, there are a few barriers to my normal baking routine. First, I don't have my usual supply of flour, sugar, vanilla, butter, etc. Second, while the place we're staying has a full community kitchen with lots of utensils, I don't have my beloved Kitchen Aid mixer (Brandon jokes it would be the first thing I'd rescue in a fire). Third, Australia uses the metric system and Celsius. But, I decided I was up for the challenge and forged ahead. 

I walked the block to the grocery store (once again, so awesome how close it is!), and found the baking aisle. Flour and cocoa powder were straight forward, but there were at least a dozen sugar options to choose from. The baking soda and baking powder were on a shelf with other powders I had never used, like citric acid. Chocolate chips were called chocolate buttons (so cute!). The butter was in grams, not sticks. Buying these items took me at least four times longer than in the US, but I thoroughly enjoyed examining the options. 

Australian baking products. Notice the "chocolate buttons" and grams listed on top of the butter. 

Armed with supplies I took over the kitchen and started to work my way thru the recipe. I preheated the oven to 160 ish degrees Celcius (325 degrees Fahrenheit). I specifically chose my triple chocolate espresso cookie recipe, because you melt the butter. Melted butter is easier to mix by hand, since I didn't have access to my mixer. *Tear*. As aforementioned the butter was in grams, but thanks to Google I determined that 1/2 stick  of butter is 56.7 grams. I used the 50 gram hatch marks on the butter to guesstimate the amount. The rest of the recipe was easy as all the measuring spoons and cups in the kitchen had metric and english measurements. Yay! 

Well stocked kitchen sans Kitchen Aid mixer

What was the cost? Well, it would have been cheaper to just satisfy my sweet tooth with ice cream for $4 AUD ($2.81 USD), but then I wouldn't have had the satisfaction of baking in Australia. Plus, I have enough ingredients left over to make these cookies a couple more times. The total was $19.62 AUD ($13.78 USD), not including eggs, which we had already bought, and salt and espresso powder that our host had. 

Baking ingredient receipt

How did the cookie turn out? Perfect. Just like at home. Test subject Brandon agrees. 

Triple chocolate espresso cookies. Yum!

Our First Full Day in Melbourne

G'day from Melbourne, Australia! After waking from a good night of sleep, we had a simple breakfast provided by our thoughtful host. We then decided to check out the grocery store, Coles, which is literally a block from the house. So awesomely convenient! We're going to be so spoiled for the next month. We toured the whole grocery store to evaluate prices and array of products before buying enough for a few meals and carrying it home. 

After our grocery excursion, we walked a block south to the ocean. Yes, our place is located just one street away from the ocean! Well, really it's Port Phillip Bay which then empties into the Bass Straight which then turns into the Tasman Sea to the East and the Great Australian Bight to the West (see our map for picture evidence). But, it's still salty, pungent ocean water. There is a paved path all along the bay where we live, which makes for a nice walk for us or a run for me. 

Altona Beach on Port Phillip Bay 

View of the shoreline from the Altona Pier

We then wandered Altona for awhile, discovering a second grocery store, civic center, several restaurants, kite and surfing shop, thrift store, and more. After returning home to fix some lunch, we decided to take the train into the city center to further explore Melbourne. We got off at the Melbourne Central Station, looking for a board game store and a rock climbing gym. Our board game quest was foiled by Melbourne having both a Lonsdale and Little Lonsdale Street (and me not writing down the exact address). Despite picking the wrong street, we found a different board game place. What are the odds? But, they didn't have Hanabi, the game we were looking for, and referred us to their sister store. We ended up not being able to find any other board game stores as we didn't have proper maps, but as we wandered we discovered having a street name and then a "little" street of the same name was quite common. 

We did successfully find the climbing gym we were looking for. It was very busy inside, and we were told this was because we are in the midst of a two week Australian school holiday. There was no bouldering, but apparently their sister gym in a far suburb has bouldering as well as more space. Also interesting was the route ratings. There is a separate Australian rating scale called the Ewbank System which is different from the Yosemite Decimal System we are used to. 

We left the gym and wandered around the city more walking thru Chinatown and past a University and State Library. We then stumbled upon James Squire Brewhouse and seeing fermentation tanks on the premises we decided it was promising to enter. We sat at the bar and the barkeep let us sample a few things before deciding on a Chocolate Cherry Stout. It was happy hour, so our beer was "only" $8 AUD per pint (about $5.62 USD). For us in the US, that's a normal price, not a happy hour price...I guess we'll only be drinking during happy hour here in Australia! Chatting with the barkeep, we discovered he'd been to Founders in Grand Rapids (small world)! We talked craft brew and then discovered he was a fountain of advice about restaurants around Melbourne. We wrote down quite a few recommendations and heard about a beer festival happening this Sunday in an old prison before business picked up and we had to let him go. Such a cool experience! You never know who you're going to meet! 

We navigated the train system, found our way home, made dinner, and called it a night. Quite a successful first day in Melbourne! 

Travels from Hawaii to Australia

September 23rd was big day of travel for us as we changed continents and crossed the International Date Line. We arrived at the Honolulu airport a little before 7 am only to find that our 9 am flight was delayed til 10:40 am. We weren't too concerned as we had a direct flight from Honolulu to Melbourne and didn't have to worry about missing any connections. It turns out that if you have to wait for a flight the Honolulu airport is a good place to do it. Much of the airport is open-air, which seems sketchy in terms of security, but we weren't going to complain about fresh air and sunshine. There's even a beautiful courtyard in the center of the airport with Japanese and Chinese gardens. We spent a lot of time enjoying these areas as we waited. 

This does not look like an airport, but it is!

Brandon in the Chinese garden

The garden was full of bridges, sitting areas, waterfalls, and vegetation

Eventually, we were able to board our flight to Melbourne. We flew Jetstar, which is a budget airline, so we weren't sure what to expect, but as it turns out we were favorably impressed. Brandon is planning on writing a post at some point reviewing Jetstar for any of you interested in the airline. A 10.5 hour flight feels long no matter what airline you're flying, so we were thrilled when the plane set down in Melbourne's Tullamarine Airport. We then went thru the customs and baggage claim process before figuring out our way to our Airbnb stay in the suburb of Altona. 

Hello, Australia!

I had done some research on how to reach our final destination, so that we wouldn't feel completely lost. The website Rome2rio was particularly helpful to our success. We easily bought Skybus tickets for $18 AUD one-way per person to get from the airport to Southern Cross Station, about a 20 minute ride. The double-decker Skybus is super convenient as it comes every 7 minutes and it has free wifi. It was a great ride for us, because we got to sit on the top deck in front of a huge window for a cool view as we entered the city center.  

On the Skybus, super excited to be in Australia! G'day mates!

At Southern Cross Station, I knew we needed to purchase Myki Passes for the Metro train system to get to Altona. After information from a kind security guard, we found the ticket counter and purchased our passes from a thoroughly helpful agent. We looked at the screens and determined the line and platform we needed for the correct train. Since we had 20 minutes til the next train we needed, we grabbed some food from Pie Face, which is apparently a popular Australian chain, before heading to the train. As luck would have it our train was delayed as well. We fretted a bit about whether we had really picked the correct train until it came, and when we got on we were very happy to get some confirmation that it was indeed the line we wanted. Success! We made it to the Altona station and then followed some easy walking instructions to our Airbnb stay, only about 3 minutes away. 

Our public transit route from airport to Airbnb

At the Airbnb, we were greeted cheerfully by host, Jacqui. She made us feel immediately very much at home as she introduced us to our room, fellow guests, and important things around the house. After hot showers we were ready for bed and looking forward to our first full day in Melbourne the next day. 

Our bed, towels, toiletries, and bottle of wine awaiting us

Hawaii Adventures: Part Three

On Monday we had a chance to explore more of the island. In the morning, Becky’s friend Amanda was kind enough to take us on a hike on the east side of the island. On the drive there we had magical views out the window as it rained enough to create several steep waterfalls running down between the sheer mountain faces. We were glad the weather cleared more as we approached our hike, so it wouldn’t be too slick and muddy. Many O’ahu hikes are considered dangerous or challenging as they involve steep, windy ridges and cliff edges, slippery surfaces, and even ropes or cables to provide a semblance of safety. The hike we did was a good, easy introduction rising uphill along a relatively wide ridge to two pillboxes overlooking Lanikai Beach. The pillboxes used to be cement bunkers holding artillery to protect the island. Now they are covered with colorful graffiti, and we climbed on top of them to enjoy views of the beautiful island landscape below. We were able to see Bellows Beach that we visited on Sunday, Lanikai Beach, Kailua Beach, Flat Island, the two Moku Islands, the edge of the North Shore, Enchanted Lake, fancy beach homes, and the lush moutain greenery. It was spectacular, and Brandon took several panormic pictures to try to capture the impressiveness. We definitely want to do more hikes with Amanda when we return to Hawaii in December.

The ridge we hiked to the pillboxes

Panorama of Lanikai Beach and the Moku Islands

Bellows Beach

Enchanted Lake in Kailua surrounded by houses and mountains  

Entrance on the top of a pillbox

On top of a pillbox with the Moku behind us

We all made it to the top! 

We successfully finished the hike!  

After the hike, we all met up with Becky and her son for some delicious crepes. Brandon and I split a savory and a sweet crepe. Amanda recommended a savory crepe filled with brie, apples, macadamia nuts, and black pepper and served with a side of honey, which proved to be excellent. The sweet crepe had bananas, nutella (a crepe necessity), peanut butter cups, and fresh whipped cream, which would satisfy any sweet tooth. I love crepes.

Our delicious crepes 

Becky and Amanda enjoying their crepes

Amanda had things to get done the rest of the day, but we continued with Becky to Kailua Beach. We slathered ourselves with sunscreen as we’ve learned that the sun seems more intense in Hawaii than in Michigan, and I even wore a t-shirt in the ocean for more sun protection. Brandon and I then used the boogie boards in the warm water to our heart’s content.

Riding a wave

Brandon having fun in the waves...I didn't take as good of pictures as he did

After drying off and changing, Becky drove us along the east and south coasts of the island all the way back to the house in Aiea Heights. We got out of the car several times to appreciate the gorgeous views. We looked at palm tree filled coastal towns and bright blue bays from atop high coastal cliffs. We saw a red and white lighthouse guarding a point. We observed a blow hole spouting spray and waves crashing violently along a rocky shore filled with tidal pools hosting small fish and dismembered crabs.

Stunning coastal panorama

Taking in the scenery

So vividly blue and green

Beautiful rocky coastline and beach

Powerful waves crashing into the rocks and feeding tidal pools

Brandon catching some spray from the waves

Blowhole in the rocky coastline

Eventually we made a stop at Kona Brewing Company to relax, enjoy some brews, and free the baby from the car seat. We all shared a flight including Pipeline Porter, Black Sand Porter, Lavaman Red, and Lemongrass Ginger Luau. The Pipeline Porter with its roasty flavor and the refreshing taste of the Lemongrass Ginger Luau made those our favorites.

Enjoying our Kona beer and the lovely patio

Left to Right: Luau, Lavaman, Black Sand, Pipeline

The whole day was a truly fabulous way to say goodbye to Hawaii before leaving for Australia the next morning!