Our Favorite Australian City

Throughout our Australian adventure we have been called out many times on the fact that when people ask us where we are from we say "San Francisco" instead of "the states" or "the US", etc. We are proud to be from San Francisco and heaven forbid someone automatically think we are from LA and Dodger fans (sorry Jess and Anthony ;) should we just say we were from "the States." On the subject of cities, and because we are 2 days away from being done with our 6-week Australian adventure, I thought now would be a good time to rank the major cities we have visited while in this beautiful country.

#5. Brisbane: I have nothing to say either positive or negative. We only spent 24 hours here and it was OK for a city.


#4. Cairns: We loved Port Douglas which was about an hour north. Cairns is the gateway to the Great Barrier Reef therefore it is very touristy and crowded. The weather is great and the reef was beautiful from Port Douglas, however (other than the lagoon, which is where we spent most of our time) the city itself seemed to be made up of strip malls and bars.


#3. Perth: We are still here...more on this city to come...


#2: Sydney: Our vision of the city may be clouded by the fact that we got to spend our time there with Becky, but Sydney is an amazing place! We had a great time exploring and the weather (other than a few torrential downpours) and scenery were perfect. We felt so lucky that we got to spend time at sites that are so picture postcard perfect.


#1. Drum roll please......Melbourne! Melbourne is the city that if I was traveling internationally and someone asked me where I was from, I would say 'Melbourne' instead of 'Australia'. We spent 5 days here, 2 of which I previously wrote about on the Great Ocean Road. Melbourne has so much culture and art and is considered the sport capital of Australia. The cab driver who drove us to our hostel from the airport said that people from Melbourne will wager on two flies climbing a wall. Our first full day here was Easter Sunday and we spent it at St. Kilda....imagine Santa Cruz in Australia.

 

Look at these cake shops (not bakeries!) 

After St. Kilda we did the Great Ocean Road and then spent the remaining time exploring the city. One of the guys we went to Fraser Island with is from Melbourne and he happened to be home for Easter and spent a day touring the city with us. One of of our first stops was where the Australian Open is held. Before I started dating Nelly I was never really a tennis fan but learned the rules from him this past January when we watched the Open together. It was fun to get to see it in person.


We then spent then day touring different watering holes followed by dinner in China Town.


Unfortunately I do not have more pictures of the city as we were having too much fun.....

Needless to say we have enjoyed everywhere here but some have stuck out more than others!



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Location:Melbourne