South Korea

 We both very much enjoyed our time in Korea.

The country is mountainous but most people live in the flatter areas with Seoul and Busan being the two biggest cites.

Regarding travel, the primary attraction for me has always been the great outdoors and scenery in particular. In the case of Korea, surprisingly, what impressed me the most were the cities. Given that it was Spring the landscape was still pretty bare and this coupled with the ubiquitous haze that meant you couldn’t see much of it anyway - in the summer I am sure the landscape would be prettier but the haze, which is primarily caused by pollution from China, would still likely be there. The cities on the other hand were full of amazing buildings and bridges and infrastructure in general, along all sorts of random works of art. There was also no litter which is a huge bugbear with me. At least compared to New Zealand, Korea feels like a very wealthy and prosperous country.

We found Koreans friendly, helpful and polite. Most of us are super addicted to our phones but Koreans have taken it to the next level and it was a rarity to see someone without one - we even saw scooter riders riding with one hand on the bars and the other hand and their eyes on their phone!

Compared to Japan, which I visited last year, Korea feels much more westernised with an obsession with American sports and fast food chains everywhere - there are over 600 Starbucks in Seoul alone! There were also far fewer temples and (obvious) local culture than in Japan. The obsession with all things American is understandable though as without their help the North would have won the war and the democratic South wouldn’t exist.

The Korean food was also great with the night market food stalls being a particular favourite.

The train, bus and subway systems were excellent and a great way of getting around. A T-Money card is the best way to access most transport which you use to tag-on and tag-off. The cards can be purchased from airports and most convenience stores and are the first thing you should buy. One peculiarity of the T-Money cards is that while you can purchase them with a credit card you have to load them up with WON using cash although this is no big deal as there are machines everywhere.

For general spending we used WISE cards although for food stalls we used cash.

For navigation we used the Naver app. This was a little temperamental at times but overall was brilliant for getting around.

Also used was the Papago translation app. This was surprisingly useful and got used a lot.

Korean internet and cell phone networks are excellent and really quick. I used an eSIM (UBIGI) for the first time and this worked seamlessly and was a lot cheaper than going on roam with my local Kiwi provider.

01 Apr 25

Fairly uneventful flight to Hong Kong other than sitting in the wrong seats twice - both times our fault!

On the plane I watched the Oscar nominated Brutalist which was basically There Will be Blood for architects. Very long, and not a bad movie but not deserving of an Oscar in my opinion. Also watched was Free Solo and Stop Making Sense both of which I have seen before and both of which deserved a second viewing.

We had a 4 hour wait in Hong Kong for our next flight to Incheon and are both very tired and are getting too old for this shit.

02 Apr 25

The flight from Hong Kong wasn’t too bad, unlike the monster queue at immigration which was too bad.

We stayed for 3-nights at the All Stay Hostel in Jung-Gu. The hostels location is superb, and overall, given the modest amount of money we paid, the place was fine. 

The room however was really really small at around 2m x 3m and there was literally no room to swing a cat, although a kitten might be OK.

We were both pretty tired but still did the touristy thing spending the afternoon at the nearby Namdaemun Market. 

03 Apr 25

A great day.

We took the number 2 subway line to Jamsil where we visited the 555m tall Lotte Tower which is one of the taller buildings in the world and a sight to behold. 

Before going up the tower we walked around the large lake next to the building. 

The lake is lined with trees that were just starting to blossom and in another week or so, will, I am sure, look amazing. We had a delicious alfresco lunch of fried chicken and rice balls bought from a nearby food stall.

We then headed up the tower. 

Neena chickened out, but I booked the Lotte Tower Bridge Walk. This entailed putting on a bright red suit, a safety harness and a helmet and then climbing up 20 flights of stairs above the main observation area. From here I proceeded to walk across a narrow bridge linking the two towers at the top of the building. It felt exhilarating to be out in the open air at over 500m but wasn’t really that scary. The stairs and walkway were well protected and in my opinion the safety gear was unwarranted, but I guess it is there in case someone tries something stupid, which humans being humans, someone will.

After this we made our way back to the hostel using the somewhat glitchy but very useful Naver app.

A word on Seoul. The city is ultra modern and while it has an oriental flavour definitely feels more westernised than the cities I visited in Japan last year. The are hundreds of tall skyscrapers many of which are impressively designed and way nicer than anything back in NZ which after visiting Seoul feels like some kind of provincial backwater. There are also many works of art and sculptures dotted randomly around the cities streets which give the place a lot of charm.

There are clearly a great many wealthy people in Seoul and there are more Ferraris and Lamborghini’s and Porsches than you can shake a stick at.

04 Apr 25

To me, whenever someone says they have visited South Korea the first thing that comes to mind is the DMZ. With this in mind I somehow felt compelled to visit the area and a little reluctantly booked a tour, as much as anything to avoid spending the rest of my life explaining why I didn’t visit the DMZ when I had the chance.

We duly signed up on a tour and, in order, we visited the Peace Park, the Number 3 tunnel, a border post and finally a small shopping area designed to relieve us of our hard earned cash on souvenirs and other assorted tat.

The Peace Park was nice and probably the highlight of the day.

The number 3 tunnel was dug secretly by North Korea (DPRK) to invade the South but was discovered in 1978 which put paid to their dastardly plans. 

Access to the North’s tunnel was via a very steep and long but modern tunnel which when it reaches the DPRK’s tunnel becomes low, narrow, rough hewn and claustrophobic and eventually stops at a dead end where the tunnel has been sealed of to prevent any Northern naughtiness. 

This is all well and good but such were the numbers of tourists that you could only really spend a few seconds at the end before turning round for the slog back to the surface. To add insult to injury cameras were banned for “security reasons” which seemed nuts - it is not like the tunnel is a secret as the North already know about it, not least as they built it, and visiting it must be South Koreas biggest tourist attraction!

Next came the border post but that was also frustrating as again the military wouldn’t allow us to take any pictures and we could only look at the North through a glass window - what the heck, we might just as well have watched it on TV! Neena and I however sneaked outside and found a good old fashioned fence to look through. This relatively unimpeded view made all the difference and it was an eerie feeling looking over into North Korea.

In all fairness to the military, there have been heightened tensions recently with the North sending over balloons loaded with excrement and other foul substance’s. The South have retaliated by playing K-Pop over loudspeakers directed at the North which seems like ample revenge to me as shit is indeed shit, but it isn’t a shit as K-Pop (Gangnam Style excepted).

All in all, despite the frustrations, I am still jolly glad we did the DMZ tour.

In the evening we had a traditional Korean BBQ at a nearby restaurant. 

We had pork which was cooked on our own very ornate grill by our own chef. The meat itself was very nice and was accompanied by about a dozen small side dishes, all of which were cold. Among other “delicacies”, there was cold soup and various types of kimchi along with a a weird egg dish. 

I tried most of the dishes even though I hate cold clammy food, so this was an especially trying evening for me. We also had some Danish Kelly beer, which was the highlight of the meal.

Korean style BBQ restaurants were absolutely everywhere and probably the main tourist “culinary experience” so we just had to do it. It was a fun night out, but neither of us was impressed enough to do it again.

A special note must be made of Queen’s Bakery which has become our go to place for our morning coffee and bun.

05 Apr 25

We swapped from the All Stay Hostel to the rather less claustrophobic Olive Hostel R situated in nearby Myeongdong and close to the Namsan Mountain cable car. The new room certainly had more space along with a small kitchen and even a washing machine. What the place did lack however is a common area, so we were basically stuck in a room with only one chair, although for the price we paid it’s difficult to grumble too much, although we did anyway.

Other than that, it was cold and rainy from start to finish, so a bit of a nothing day.

No cat swinging here...

Some of the electrics were a bit dodgy

06 April 25

We woke to another cold, but mercifully dry day.

In the morning we walked to the Gyeonbokgung Palace just in time to watch the changing of the guard. This palace is a big tourist attraction and there were hundreds of the people (locals and tourists) watching dressed in traditional Korean clothes, with the women in particular, looking very fetching.

On the way there we passed a huge rally which I think was in response to the impeachment of the countries president. Whether they were for or against said impeachment I am not sure.

We then had an early lunch of Korean dumplings and sweet pancakes at a roadside stall. The pancakes in particular were superb.

After this we jumped on the subway system and headed to Gangnam, which was of course made famous by PSY. 

For some reason I thought the area would be a little low rent but the reality was quite the opposite with Gangnam oozing money from every pore.

After Gangnam we decided to walk to the “nearby” Han River . An hour and a half later we finally made it. It was actually a nice walk and a great way to see parts of Seoul not normally visited by tourists. All in all, we walked at least 10kms which was a surprise to me as I have a long term issue with pain in both my feat and can barely walk at times.

All in all, a pretty nice day.

07 April 25

Another long day doing the tourist thing. Lovely weather.

We walked to the Hwanghakdong Flea Market. On the way we passed a load of motorbike shops which had all sorts of weird and wonderful bikes, many of which are not available in the West, or NZ at any rate. My favourite was a cruiser style bike with a flat-6 engine. Only Honda make these kind of engines which are used in their Goldwing and Valkyrie models, but this particular bike looked like neither, although I suspect was a modified Valkyrie.

After much mooching around the flea market, I bought some biscuits and Neena Moringa tea and some Muchi. 

When then headed back to our hostel in Myeongdong for a quick cup of tea and then headed back out again.

We took the nearby Namsan cable car to the Namsan Seoul Tower. We quickly brought our tickets and then not so quickly queued for an hour and a half for the bloody cable car.

When we eventually arrived, the views over Seoul made it worth the wait.

By the time we arrived back from the cable car it was getting late so we by-passed the hostel and went straight to the local night market.

The market was huge with thousands of people there and hundreds of stalls. The original plan was eat at a restaurant but we are both fans of dining alfresco so it was the stalls for us. 

We shared fried honey chicken, egg loaf and pancakes. The egg loaf was especially good.

Also had was pomegranate juice, which despite some trepidation on my part, was actually rather nice.

By this stage we were both pretty shattered and my knees and feet were killing me, so it was a cup of Moringa, some biscuits and then bed.

08 April 25

It’s train to Busan day, hopefully without the zombies.

We travelled to the nearby Seoul Station and then booked tickets to Busan on the KTX bullet train.

The scenery for the first part of the trip was a bit bleak as the terrain was flat, often industrial or otherwise bare, along with the ubiquitous Korean haze. As we got closer to Busan the terrain became more mountainous and varied and interesting. The train itself was smooth, quiet and fast.

We stayed at the Residence Mumum Hotel. This was a step up from our previous accommodation if not quite as good as its internet reviews, so no surprises there then.

In the evening we had chilli chicken and beer at a local restaurant. The meal was great and I also learned a valuable life lesson which is to wash your hands before (and after) you go to the bathroom, especially if you have been eating red hot chilli’s. - you have been warned.

09 April 25

The plan of action for the day was to visit a (locally) famed cherry blossom tree street and then travel to the even more renowned Haeundae Beach.

The cherry blossom was in full bloom so we couldn’t have timed it any better. It turned out that the street is very close to the sea so we walked down to the coast and found a lovely wide beautifully maintained and engineered path. There were some skyscrapers in the distance so we decided to head towards them and see how far we got.

The skyscrapers over here are huge and consequently are further away than they look and we ended up walking for miles to reach them. 

On the way we came across the somewhat unheralded Gwangali Beach. The beach was lovely and sandy and in need of a paddle, which was duly done.

We eventually reached the skyscrapers and as it was such a nice day we just carried on. 

Eventually we reached Haeundae Beach which really was a stunning sight, so I can see what all the fuss is about. After lunch and some loafing about we headed back to the hotel.

We had originally intended to take the subway to Haeundae Beach and had no intention of walking. For us, it is often these spur of the moment making it up as you go along days that are the most rewarding, as it was this day.

We did indeed take the subway when we came back and it is a measure of how far we walked that it was 26 stops on the train line before we got back to Busan. 

Dinner was at a cheap and cheerful local restaurant. We were the only foreigners there and the vibe and food (Tofu and Rice and Beef Noodle Soup) were great.

10 April 25

We visited the Gamcheon Culture Village today. This entailed a subway ride and then a trudge up a dirty great hill. 

The place was very picturesque and full of shops selling tourist tat, but we were unable to find out where the culture was. There was even a British themed cafe selling sausage and mash and full English breakfasts but limited ourselves to some English breakfast tea and watched the world go by.

11 Apr 25

We took the TKX bullet train to Seoul. This wasn’t as straightforward as it should have been. As is our want, we turned up at the ticket office in Busan Station at about 11am only to be told that there were no seats available until 8pm, but that there were some “standing seats” available for the 1pm train. We didn’t fancy hanging around, so that’s what we went for, even though if it was going to mean standing for over 3hrs.

The standing area, which was pretty small, was located near the toilets at end of our carriage. In the end, it didn’t work out too bad as the area had two small flip down seats, which Neena and I, being some of the first passengers onboard, managed to bag. It still wasn’t the most comfortable journey but it could have been a lot worse. My tip is to do what we didn’t do, and book in advance.

We did meet a very nice lady on the train who was carrying her cat in a bag with a transparent cover and breathing ports. The bag was strapped to her chest and the cat very large so Neena offered to cat sit for the lady who was only to keen to oblige as it was literally a weight of her shoulders. 

The cat was very pretty and had a lovely temperament, and as ever, much nicer than our Libby, even though we love her despite all her faults.

Once again, we are staying at the Olive Hostel R. To be honest, not the first choice, but by central Seoul standards it was very cheap and got the job done.

We had dinner at the local night market. 

12 April 25

We hit the subway again and visited the Starlight Library and also PSY’s famous Gangnam Hand statue, which was nearby.

The library really was quite something with shelves at least 10 metres high housed in a stunning looking building. Libraries are supposed to be places of quiet contemplation and study but there was not much chance of that given the numbers of tourists and you would need jolly long arms to reach the books.

Next was the Gangnam Hands statue where Neena and I duly did our best PSY impression, which given the results, still needs a lot of work.

Not long after this rain started to fall and we made a strategic retreat back to Myeong-dong.

The rain continued to fall and it got progressively colder, so dinner consisted of a quick soggy trip to the night market.

13 Apr 25

Cold and windy with snow flurries!

A bit of a nothing day as all we really did was get some coffee and I brought some chocolates for work. This was in part due to the weather but mostly us being in holiday wind-down mode and looking forward to getting back to NZ.

One big plus point on this trip has been my feet. I was barely able to walk prior to coming here and so experimented with high 12mm drop trail runners which is a big change from the zero drop shoes I have been using the last few years. The difference has been something of a revelation with my now feet about ten times better, although still with some discomfort.

In the evening we had Chicken Galbi at a local restaurant. This is a traditional Korean shared dish of marinated chicken, rice cakes, sweet potatoes, green cabbage and perilla leaves, whatever they are. It was an enjoyable meal but could have done with a little seasoning, which I think would have raised things up a notch. 

After the meal we headed out into the cold and very much on the spur of the moment had coffee at a cat cafe. This was pretty pricey but the cats were great and who, once again, put our cat Libby to shame. 

These kind of cafes are primarily for sentimental cat lovers like us, so it was an unexpected surprise at how great the “complimentary” coffee was.

After this we headed back to the hostel watched the obligatory real-crime show and went to bed.

14 April 25

A cold wet and miserable day - a bit like a British winter, but with better food.

We took the train to Incheon. 

We arrived at around midday but our hotel’s (The Seattle) check-in time wasn’t until 4pm so we took refuge from the cold and the rain in a local cafe and started planning our next trip to the not-so-good-old US of A.

I had a non-coffee toffee nut latte, which was divine. Neena had a proper hazelnut latte, which as usual, she couldn’t taste.

We had dinner at a small unassuming restaurant just over the road from our hotel. We had Korean spicy sausage and rice soup. Neena also had her beloved Kimchi which is basically fermented cabbage - about the only good thing I can say about it is that it tastes less awful than the German equivalent, Sauerkraut . Kimchi aside, the food was delicious and reasonably priced and as an added bonus we were the only foreigners there.

15 April 25

We flew back to Wellington.

Where the hell are the Lions?

Where to start with this one?

We had booked to go on safari in Kenya and then on to Zanzibar but somehow ended up in Australia, so rather than lions and giraffes we got kangaroos and koalas.

I am not going to go into all the gory and depressing details, but essentially, the airline ticketing process went horribly wrong. We booked through MyTrip who so far as I can see are a legitimate company and get reasonable reviews but who somehow managed to book us on a couple non-existent flights and not at all on our first flight from Wellington to Sydney.

We eventually made it to Sydney but couldn’t make our flight to Nairobi, not least as the carrier no longer flys there! We could have flown with another carrier (at huge cost) and just about made the safari but with a big question mark over our flights to Zanzibar and even back to Wellington.

We spent many hours at airline help desks in Sydney and Wellington and I personally made dozens of phone calls and have rarely been so stressed. The staff at both help desks said that a large part of their work is dealing with problems relating to third-party vendors - their advice (and indeed now mine) was to book direct with airlines or through local travel agents. On average this will cost a bit more but you are far less likely to have any issues, and if you do, they should be easier to resolve and certainly preferable to dealing with elusive third-party vendors.

In the end, we very reluctantly decided to forego flying to Nairobi. The choice then was to either accept defeat and crawl back to NZ or stay in Australia. We elected to make the most of a bad situation and stay in Australia.

We spent three days in Sydney with our friend Kathy and then hired a car and spent the next week working our way down to Melbourne via the Blue Mountains and the Great Ocean Road.

It actually turned into a really enjoyable trip with both of us surprisingly sanguine about the whole thing. 

My pride and confidence though has taken quite a knock as organising our trips is my responsibility and I feel that that I should have double and triple checked everything as is my want, but I suspect a bit of complacency has crept in over the years.

We called our friend Kathy who lives in Sydney and she offered to pick us up the next day and said we could stay with her.

By now it was very late and we were both tired and stressed so ended up paying an extortionate $500 to stay at a shit hotel near the airport. To add insult to injury our already barely alive air conditioning unit finally gave up the ghost and dripped water all over me. Oh what a fun night we had.

06 Oct 24

Our angel of mercy Kathy picked us up in the morning and drove us to her house in Faulconbridge on the edge of the Blue Mountains NP. 

Kathy took us to the nearby Wentworth Falls which were beautiful, as were the mountains in general. 

We chilled out for the rest of the day with Kathy and her delightful cat, Miss Kitty. 

Miss kitty has a lovely temperament and wonderfully expressive eyes and is also the world’s best lap cat - Neena and I were both smitten and wanted to take her back home. Our cat Libby is definitely going to have to raise her game! 

Lovely warm sunny weather.

07 Oct 24

The Blue Mountains again, this time at the nearby town of Katoomba where we were availed of yet more stunning scenery - Australia is way more scenic than I expected and certainly gives NZ a run for its money. 

Lovely weather again.

08 Oct 24

We tackled the Birdwood Gully walk located close to Kathy’s place. In stark contrast to the last two days the weather was cold and wet. The track itself was steep in places but was pretty and tranquil and a real hidden gem. As a bonus, we didn’t see a single soul.

09 Oct 24

We bade a very fond farewell to Kathy and Miss Kitty and then jumped into our hire car and headed south.

The traffic was pretty busy going out of Sydney with the suburbs seeming to go on forever. Eventually we left town and the traffic thinned out (a bit).

We stopped for lunch at Nonners Olive Tree Cafe at Albion Park and had Beef, Bacon and Cheese Pies, bread and butter pudding and tea, all of which were very good.

We stayed at the Golf View Motel at Sanctuary Point about 200km south of Sydney.

Right by the hotel, funnily enough, is a golf course. We wandered over to the course and spotted loads of Kangaroos.

The weather was cloudy and cool, though warmer than the previous day.

10 Oct 24

We drove to Jervis Bay Marine Park had a mooch around and then it was coffee and custard square time at a nearby cafe. The beach was nice and sandy and the scenery equally nice. The sea looked inviting so off came the socks and in went a pair of pasty British feet. This must have come as quite a shock to the local sea-life but was even more shocking for me as the water wasn’t as tropical as it looked and felt like it had come straight from Antarctica.

We continued heading south for a good while before stopping at the Eurobodalla Regional Botanical Gardens. After being suitably revived by a cup of tea and pecan slice we set off exploring the gardens. The grounds are quite extensive and we spent a fair while wandering around with me looking for snakes and Neena communing with the trees. To Neena’s relief and my disappointment we didn’t find any snakes, but we did spot lots of trees.

We eventually set off again and ended up staying the night in Eden at the Eden Nima Motel. The motel wasn’t of the garden of variety, but did the job.

The weather was sunny and hot.

11 Oct 24

A big travel day this, but a very scenic one.

From Eden we drove due west along endless tight and twisty roads to the ski resort of Thredbo situated high in the Snowy Mountains. 

From here we planned to take a chairlift up to view Australia’s highest peak, Mt Kosciuszko. It was however not to be as the lift was shut for maintenance and I doubt it would have been open anyway due to high winds battering the peaks. This was really disappointing as I had been looking forward to mucking about in the snow (that was somehow clinging on despite the heat) even if it would inevitably mean being ambushed by Neena with a well aimed snowball.

We did toy with the idea of staying at Thredbo but the accomodation was expensive and to be honest ski resorts out of season aren’t the prettiest of places.

We therefore decided to carry on and dropped down the even twistier western side of the Snowy Mountains. Being a biker and petrolhead in general I am very partial to winding roads but this was getting ridiculous so it was a relief when the road eventually straightened out and we arrived in the town of Albury where we stayed the night at the pretty decent Meramie Motor Inn. 

A sunny and hot day, even up at Thredbo.

12 Oct 24

Very much a travelling day, so no photos.

Neena has always been mad keen to visit IKEA and experience their “legendary” meatballs. On the way to Geelong, where we planned to stay the night, is the town of Richmond which just happened to have an IKEA store. It wasn’t too much of a detour from the highway, so we just had to go there. 

Neena finally sampled the fabled meatballs so was happy, even though she couldn’t actually taste them! For my part, I thought they were bland but pleasant enough, so fail to see what all the fuss is about. At least they weren't playing any Abba.

We stayed at an apartment in Geelong run by 16 Scenic Regional Escapes. It was nice change to stay in a reasonably upmarket place but the online check-in system was crazy complex requiring photo ID and mug shots along with loads of stupid questions.

We will be doing the Great Ocean Road tomorrow.

It was cool but sunny and we didn’t see a cloud all day.

13 Oct 24

We woke to a lovely sunny and warm Sunday during the school holidays. 

This is normally a recipe for heavy traffic and frustration and this day didn’t disappoint. Not initially, anyway.

We had a sluggish start and didn’t get on the road until late morning by which time the traffic had well and truly got its act together. 

We drove down to Torquay and then on to the start of the Great Ocean Road. 

The first couple of hours were hard work due to the traffic and we had constant troubles trying to find somewhere to park and even when we did the scenery, although nice enough, was a little underwhelming.

The day turned round when we arrived at the small settlement of Kennet River. By this time most of the traffic had melted away and we found a nice cafe with a friendly owner and, praise the gods, even managed to bag a parking spot and a table. 

We had a leisurely lunch and photographed some Crimson Rosella parrots and Cockatoos who were hanging around scrounging for food.

The main reason for visiting Kennet River was to bag some Koala’s as this location is supposed to be one of the best spots to see them on the Great Ocean Road.

We had a very pleasant walk up the river and did indeed find a solitary Koala dozing high up in a tree.

This was a terrific stop and turned a very average day into a very good one.

We spent the night at the excellent Sandpiper Motel in Apollo Bay, although they did drop a point for not having a microwave!

14 Oct 24

We had another tardy start, but eventually hit the road.

We stopped for pies and coffee at Lavers Hill (450m). In stark contrast to yesterday, the place, despite the modest altitude, was absolutely freezing and it has apparently snowed up there in the past. As compensation, we saw lots of Crimson Rosselas.

Next we visited the famed Twelve Apostles which are a series of sea stacks just off the coastline. Not all the Apostles are in one location so we spent a pleasant afternoon driving along the coast photographing them.

Well mostly pleasant. While there we saw two woman jump a (substantial) fence and walk to the edge of the crumbling cliff while some guy filmed them despite all sorts of warning signs pointing out how dangerous this is. I told them they were idiots which I shouldn’t have done, but at least there were some consequences for their actions - if they had fallen I would have given them a round of applause.

The guy filming instantly became aggressive and I am pretty sure he would have attacked me but for the women there, and even then he nearly did - I am really going to have to learn to keep my mouth shut and I suspect me confronting them was in part a result of pent up frustration of missing out on the safari. What I should have done is film them and post it on YouTube (as is the modern way) with a title along the lines of Moron filming prospective Darwin candidates.

The weather started cold and drizzly but eventually the sun battled its way through. It was still cold though.

Despite the above unpleasantness, a pretty good day.

We stayed at the City Heart Motel in Warrnambool which was excellent and the best place we have stayed so far on this trip.

15 Oct 24

A very interesting day.

In the morning we visited the Tower Hill Wildlife Reserve and bagged another couple of Koalas and also spotted two Kangaroos hiding in a bush. The reserve encompasses a dormant volcano and surrounding wetlands and is very picturesque.

We would have stayed longer but we needed to be back in Melbourne early the next morning to drop off our hire car.

On the way back to Melbourne we saw some serious convection of in the distance, so Neena and I set off on an impromptu storm chase.

As we got closer it became clear this was a big storm and worthy of pursuit, not least as there looked to be some suspicious lowering of the cloud base which really got the adrenalin flowing.

I took a series of videos at around 3.45pm close to the town of Lismore and then very reluctantly abandoned the chase as we had a hotel to check into and a long way to go.

The storm produced loads of thunder, although we didn’t see any lightning.

Lo and behold, a video of a rope tornado was seen at Lismore that day and uploaded to YouTube - the tornado was recorded at 3.30pm at basically the same location we were, so we really didn’t miss it by much at all!

We stayed in the Guided Star Hotel and Motel in Brooklyn a suburb of Melbourne close to the airport. Very average, but relatively cheap and it did the job.

16 Oct 24

Melbourne’s road system is an order of magnitude larger than Wellington's, and consequently, both me and our satnav found it all rather overwhelming. This led to some fun and games dropping the car off at Goldcar, but we made it eventually.

We got an Uber into Melbourne driven by a very nice Indian guy and are staying for three nights at the YEHS Hotel close to the main Southern Cross train/bus terminal. The hotel was reasonably priced and in a fantastic location but certainly had its downsides, as detailed below.

Mini car review:

Our hire car was an MG ZS fitted with an asthmatic 1.5L motor coupled with an even worse 4-speed automatic gearbox. It’s safe to say that the transmission wasn’t the cars strongest point and that the skins of rice puddings have nothing to fear.

In most other respects the car acquitted itself well - it was reasonably quiet, rode well enough, was spacious and comfortable and most importantly reliable. Oh, and it was a very nice shade of blue.

The air conditioning in our hotel room was non existent with an indicated temperature of 25°C making life very uncomfortable.

17 Oct 24

We changed rooms and consequently our air conditioning is marginally less crap with a room temperature of 22°C.

A pleasant low key sort of day. We walked to the Botanical Gardens and chatted with a lady from Kenya of all places. She said how wonderful the country was and that we should visit - thanks a lot for that!

We then walked to the CBD and had a mooch around before returning to our hotel.

18 Oct 24

It lashed down with rain all day but we got out and about anyway. I am not a big fan of cities but found Melbourne very pleasant although the real highlights are the literally thousands of (mostly) Asian restaurants. This means a lot of competition which also means the standards are very high - I can’t say we visited them all, but the ones we did were all excellent and for me, and I suspect Neena, the best reason to come to Melbourne.

19 Oct 24

Bed bugs?

Not content with rubbish air conditioning the YEHS hotel pulled out all the stops on our last night and introduced biting things into the equation.

I woke up in the morning covered in around 30 large red bite marks that itched like crazy and which over a week later were still giving me grief! The marks look a bit to big to be from bed bugs and could possibly be from a spider or some other such beast.

This was also the day we flew back to civilisation, or at least to NZ anyway.

The last few entries are a bit negative, but overall, the trip was very enjoyable and indeed among the better ones Neena and I have done, it's just a shame there weren’t more lions!