A weekend of fun, beer, good neighbours, hangover (of the film and booze varieties) and………….oh yes, x factor auditions.
On Thursday we made a dash for the airport after work for a long weekend in Melbourne. The bonus being that Chris was able to meet us and come along too. The flight took about an hour and had passed before we knew it, although the old teacher lady sitting behind me stuffing her mouth with shortbread as she gave her opinions on every teacher in her school to some unfortunate woman, was fairly annoying.
We arrived at our hostel and dumped our stuff in our tiny cramped room, where there was barely enough standing space for all 3 of us, and headed directly to the pub at the corner. Although we couldn’t have too heavy a night as we had an early start our first tour of the weekend.
We woke at 7:30am the next morning and headed downstairs where we were picked up by this bus.
Yes people, we were heading to Ramsey Street, or Pin Oak street as it is actually known. Our tour guide, was an Irishman called Gerry. And too him everything about neighbours was ‘incredible’ or ‘amazing!!!’ “Did you know that no one has ever had sex on neighbours and that one person got pregnant just by holding a boys hand?! Incredible!!!”
We firstly headed to the Neighbours Studio, where we parked up beside the bus stop that everyone uses when leaving the show. This is actually in a set at the back of the studio beside the carpark, across from Carpenters Mechanics and beside Grease Monkeys. The lassiters complex was over the other side but we couldn’t go there as they were filming. As part of the tour we were promised a ‘star’, and I use the word ‘star’ very lightly. I was hoping for one of the Kennedy’s, preferably Susan. However, out comes this guy between Chris and me. We don’t know who he is, as none of us had bothered to watch neighbours for about 6 years. But we were told he is one of Paul Robinson’s sons. He was very nice and turns out he is Scottish and moved to Australia when he was younger. So, there goes my ambition of being the first Scot on neighbours.
After this we then headed to famous street. Just about a minutes drive from the studio, it is hidden in a suburban estate, and is actually called Pin Oak. There is 24 hour security here as someone once took a piss of Harold Bishops balcony and the real owner came out and smacked him with a cricket bat. I doubt Harold would have done that. So now there is a guard there 24/7. All houses genuinely are owned by real people apart from the one where the Scully’s and Ramsey’s used to live, no idea who is in there now, it was bought by the studio last year and is now used as a make up/storage place for when they are filming on the street.
Here are some photos of us on Ramsey Street, outside some of the houses.
House of trouser:
The Robinsons:
The house now used for make-up etc:
This was probably my highlight from the whole weekend. Being on the set is very weird and surreal, but very cool. The rest of Friday was spent wondering around the city centre and in the pub, naturally, followed by going to see The Hangover – part two at night. A must see. And then back to the pub.
On Saturday we wondered around the city taking in some local attractions. We went up the Eureka tower, which is the largest residential building in the southern hemisphere. The lift goes up so quickly you start to feel your ears pop, and although the view at the top is stunning, it did make me feel slightly queasy, I am not good with heights, part of the reason we didn’t go on the glass floor viewing platform, the other being it cost an extra $27.
We then headed to the SBS visual image museum. This was full of memorabilia from old TV shows and Films and lots of little exhibitions about Aussie film. Here is the actual car from the Mad Max films:
We then spent the rest of the afternoon wondering about the shops as Melbourne is supposedly famous for it’s shopping, poor mans Glasgow if you ask me though. Then at 6pm we headed to…….Bed.
Well, we headed for a nap for a couple o hours, as we wanted to stay up all night and watch the Champions League Final, which kicked off at 4:45am Australian time. So, by 8pm we were up and then headed downstairs to the pub, and then across the river for some dinner. We decided that the best place to watch the game would be in the Casino as it would be the only place still open at that time in the morning. So we had a little gamble, when in rome and all that. Chris did well and managed to win a couple of hundred dollars, I didn’t. I broke even. However, come 3am we were all starting to flag and headed back to the Hostel to watch the game in the TV room there. I am not going to talk about the game, lets just say that Barca did well. Bloody Spanish!!!
We didn’t rise on Sunday until mid afternoon. After getting a Wagamama’s for dinner we decided that we should go see a show of some sort. We heard that Cirque du Soleil was in town and showing at the Rod Laver Arena so we decided to head to that. When we got down there it is was only 5:30pm and thought that the show wouldn’t start for another couple of hours. However, we were 30 mins late. So we decided to take a walk around the area, as there are loads of other stadiums. The next one we came too, was very busy and had X Factor posters outside, not that we wanted to go in, but we decided to go and have a look to see what was happening. We then managed to find ourselves in the queue and then into the audience, which turned out to be half empty, and apparently that was the biggest crowd they had had all weekend, I fear for the next series of the Aussie X Factor.
So after 3 very long hours and 18 auditions later Mel B, Ronan Keating and a couple of aussie judges were done, and so were we, and in dire need of a pint.
Monday was very chilled out and consisted of golf, pool and a few beers before our late flight home. An awesome weekend all round, now need to book the next trip!
I also have my first work party on friday, to celebrate the end of the financial year (which is the end of June here), any excuse for a party. There was a awards ceremony in which i managed to pick up a trophy for have the best (or maybe it was worst) accent. No matter, i was very happy as you can see. 
We firstly headed to the Neighbours Studio, where we parked up beside the bus stop that everyone uses when leaving the show. This is actually in a set at the back of the studio beside the carpark, across from Carpenters Mechanics and beside Grease Monkeys. The lassiters complex was over the other side but we couldn’t go there as they were filming. As part of the tour we were promised a ‘star’, and I use the word ‘star’ very lightly. I was hoping for one of the Kennedy’s, preferably Susan. However, out comes this guy between Chris and me. We don’t know who he is, as none of us had bothered to watch neighbours for about 6 years. But we were told he is one of Paul Robinson’s sons. He was very nice and turns out he is Scottish and moved to Australia when he was younger. So, there goes my ambition of being the first Scot on neighbours. 
We didn’t rise on Sunday until mid afternoon. After getting a Wagamama’s for dinner we decided that we should go see a show of some sort. We heard that Cirque du Soleil was in town and showing at the Rod Laver Arena so we decided to head to that. When we got down there it is was only 5:30pm and thought that the show wouldn’t start for another couple of hours. However, we were 30 mins late. So we decided to take a walk around the area, as there are loads of other stadiums. The next one we came too, was very busy and had X Factor posters outside, not that we wanted to go in, but we decided to go and have a look to see what was happening. We then managed to find ourselves in the queue and then into the audience, which turned out to be half empty, and apparently that was the biggest crowd they had had all weekend, I fear for the next series of the Aussie X Factor.