Champagne and chocolate

I have found during this trip there has been a slightly ashamed feeling of rapture upon entering a town or city of any note. The thought of more than one cafe; access to Big W, and a Coles and a Woolworths; traffic lights and dual lane high streets upon which sits a chance to get petrol slightly less expensively. All this turns somewhere as relatively tame as Bairnsdale or Traralgon into a usually not so cheap thrill. Imagine then, approaching the scattered outer suburbs and seeing a sign for Melbourne pronouncing its centre to be but 50 kilometres distant.

Before I could wet my pants there was a final veer to the left back to the ocean, along the Mornington Peninsula. This curves south of Melbourne, thinning out between Port Phillip Bay on one side and the Bass Strait on the other. Thus one side appears rugged and stormy, tempestuous and wild; the other sedate and balmy, manicured and tame. The towns link together in a chain of affluence, a place where Melburnians come for the weekend, to quaff Pinot Noir and play a round of golf at the very seductive looking links courses.

We took in a bit of the rough and the smooth, on a blustery cool and showery day, a marked contrast to the heat the day before. There are pockets of national park hopefully protecting this rather prime real estate from the rampant desire to look a bit rich. Arthurs Seat rises and provides fine views as well as appreciation of cyclists who climb it. And, across the rolling stretch of wineries and alpacaries and chocolate shoppes, Cape Schank reaches out to the swirling ocean and offers a perennial opportunity to blow away cobwebs.

 

Further around, past a cluster of links courses and through a torrential thunderstorm (this not always guaranteed), the peninsula ends at Point Nepean. Here, today, a picture of choppiness and inner relief that you are on land and not crossing by ferry to the Bellarine Peninsula just across the water. Instead you are heading back along the bay, and stopping at the calmer, swankier waters of Sorrento as the sun and warmth returns.

 

And so onto Melbourne, via a stopover in Frankston, which is a suburb no doubt attempting gentrification via the development of shopping malls and the introduction of Nandos and the hope that some of the university students will stick around. On a Good Friday, when the roads are quiet, it’s but a short cruise up the Nepean Highway from here towards the city. Not quite into the city yet, but East Bentleigh, where we had the good fortune of a five bedroom house and a very generous friend with a happily holidaying Aunt and Uncle.

What followed made a good Friday great, namely a lazy lunch of Rachael’s Champagne fish with champagne on the side, a stroll around the colourful beach huts of Brighton along with a drinks break beside the water, and an evening of cheese snacking and movies interspersed with swag airing and other chores that are so much more bearable in a house.  

Easter Saturday was Melbourne city day, though it took a while to make it there. First there was obligatory yummy breakfast in a Bentleigh eatery and even more obligatory coffee on the side. Then there was a chance to live this supposed suburban dream at Chadstone Mall, shopping for little bits out of necessity (chocolate being one) and hoping to get out of the car park along with hundreds of other cars at the same time. Later on, the train through the suburbs was a more strangely appealing reminder of city life, bringing us to a CBD ironically quieter than the mall as we exited into Collins Street.

Bustle increased in intensity around Bourke Street and was positively throbbing again at Koko Black and a queue for coffee and wonderful chocolate related cake mess. Other meanders down laneways led us to Federation Square, a chance to top up once more on brochures and guides for Victoria, sit down and read them and be bothered by a lame English comedy entertainment act. Go back to where you came from!

 

A beer by the Yarra eased things down, and fuelled appetite for a walk along the river and back amongst it to grab dinner. It was laneway pasta which filled but left me unfulfilled, but I knew I would make amends tomorrow.

If Saturday was a day of hustle and bustle, Sunday was like a Sunday should be, in that I don’t think I even left the house. That’s not to say it was a case of sitting around in my pants all day. There was more washing to do; blogs to write; messages to send and calls to make; trip thinking and planning; expense calculations; brief afternoon napping; chocolate eating; and roast dinner cooking. Indeed, it’s not like you get much of a chance to cook a roast on the road, so the beef, spuds, yorkies and veg and gravy went down a treat. Very fulfilled.

I don’t think I was the only one savouring the smell and taste of a roast topside of beef. Gus, or Augustus the Conqueror, was more delirious than usual it seemed. He managed to get a few scraps, for all his expert doe eyes and tricksy pleading schemes. But he was great to have around, an extra homely feel in a very homely weekend. Huge thanks to Rachael, who I am very pleased also got to share a farewell Melbourne breakfast on Monday morning. So long short cut bacon with avocado corn salsa and jalapeno pesto on sourdough with poached eggs. Hello one pot wonders and bakery slices. It’s not like one’s better than the other, but it’s sure good to be able to get a bit of both.