Day 4 (PM): More Daylesford

We checked out of the beautiful Lake House at Daylesford this noon, but not before snapping a pretty pix of the view from our room, this time with us in the photo! (Finally got to use my new camera tripod!)

I truly enjoyed being here, surrounded by all the beauty nature has on offer, and enveloped in this joyful tranquillity. 

I don't feel like I've spent enough time here and I think I may return here soon, maybe in another season, to see what this place looks and feel like then. 

You know, there are derogatory terms like village idiot, country bumpkin... but sometimes I wonder what the antonyms of such terms are. 

Because that would describe what I am - an urbanite totally unfamiliar with the natural way of life, and always fascinated by seeing uncaged animals moving freely around, and looking different from what I usually see in the supermarket shelves or on my dinner plate. 

A flock of stupid geese following its leader to goodness knows where!

And I've lived more than 30 years without knowing that this is how ducks forage for food! By dipping their whole heads into the water!

A rude duck who keeps showing me its ass.

Met my daily quota for "take-a-nice-pix-of-Suhua-a-day" game that I'm playing with myself. Isn't she looking gorgeous here against this beautiful autumn backdrop? 

Love this photo! 

We didn't manage to make it to the Lavender farm yesterday cuz I wasn't feeling too well, but no way was I going to leave Daylesford today before seeing some alpacas!

No way!

The alpacas run over to meet us. They know visitors = feeding time! Greedy little things!

Life's not fair. Some animals are just born cuter than others. 

How does their forlorn looking eyes protect them from dangers in the wild?

Suhua fed the alpacas and they were quite happy to cam whore with me after that.

Four alpacas at Creswick Woollen Mills

I kept thinking that it would be really cool to buy a shawl made from wool shorn off real life alpacas that I had patted and photographed but alas, I have exposed my naivety again.

This is not a farm, but a woollen mill where wool is spun into products like socks, shawls and bed throws.

And since this isn't a farm, these four alpacas here are merely "show animals", to educate people like me on what an alpaca looks like. And since there are only four of them, and they are only shorn once a year, whatever is "harvested" off them is obviously not enough to supply the wool mill all year round! (The raw wool that the mill uses is sourced from somewhere else - I do hope that these "alpacas from somewhere else" are not modified genetically to look like some monster lamb overgrown with wool!!! )

Nonetheless, I did buy an alpaca shawl in the end, making it a point to buy a 100% Australian alpaca + lamb wool, spun in this mill.

And after that little animal adventure, we headed back to Melbourne, aiming to return the car in downtown Melbourne before the streets got too busy with peak hour!

Leaving the beautiful sights was a pain, but luckily the drive back was  easy enough

It was a really smooth drive back, thanks to the "NeverLost" GPS system. It actually reminded me of the different speed limits on various stretches of the expressway, and a reminder will come up whenever I went over the limit. Very useful!

But... there's always a but... my music was blasting a bit too loud and I may have missed a warning or two....

Urgh! I do hope I didn't pick up a speed ticket anywhere along the way! I heard the fine is rather hefty!

Day 4 (AM): Room With A View

The air was crisp and cool when I woke up this morning. 

The Lake House, Daylesford

Ducks (or birds of some sort) were yakking in the lake, completing the idyllic setting that I woke up to. 

Day 3: A Drive into Dreamy Daylesford

We hit the roads this morning after picking up our rental car from Hertz that came armed with a GPS kit  named "NeverLost".

I was feeling a little poorly this morning, but a trustworthy GPS system gave me a worry free drive and the beautiful scenery cheered me up

Well, "NeverLost" did its job and got us from Melbourne city to beautiful Daylesford very smoothly and on the dot! (The system told us our ETA was 12:14pm and voila! We DID arrive at that precise minute! How amazing is that?)

View from rear view window

As we approached Daylesford however, my eyes were no longer on the GPS.

Why would they be as the beautiful colours of autumn greeted us from all directions?

Voila! 

Overwhelmed by the beauty of Autumn in Daylesford, I had to stop the car along the road and snap this picture really quickly. 

What ~ a ~ beautiful ~ place Daylesford is!

We had lunch at The Convent Gallery which is a beautifully restored Catholic convent that now houses an art gallery, a retail shop, a bar, two penthouses for guests, as well as a cafe that was drenched in Autumn sun while we had lunch. 

What a perfect start to our stay in Daylesford!

Day 2: Bringing Home A Taste of Melbourne

Honey made in the rooftops of Melbourne buildings.

"Little Collins St" honey - harvested from hives in one of these rooftops? 

This 100% raw, unblended with no heat treatment honey isobtained from bee hives located at Little Collins Street. Apparently, bees from these hives forage from rooftops and gardens in a 5km radius of this street,and seeing how my hotel is along Collins Street, bees are making honey from pollinating the trees outside my hotel window!

I was totally enthralled by the idea of being able to bring home a taste of Melbourne for my friends and family in Singapore. (I snapped up all the recent harvest from Little Collins, shop owner was positively beaming when I left)

And yes, there are other “flavours” made from bee hives in othe rlocales in Melbourne city and yes, they do taste different!

And more than that, I totally dig this concept of localproduce, in an urban setting – no less! It’s too cool!

Found this shop as we explored graffiti-ed back alleys and traipsed through quaint little laneways in the middle of Melbourne CBD this morning.

Love discovering pretty things sold in cute shops. And sometimes,it’s just a pleasure to admire the beautiful shop fronts and browse through the eclectic collections in these independent shops.

There is magic to be discovered in products painstakingly crafted and put together by talented individuals and I hope this magic will never be lost.

Day 1: Outlet Shopping in Melbourne City

We were rather exhausted after the midnight flight. (So much for naively thinking that I could sleep through the flight). Although we didn’t really have the energy to go hunt for cute little shops hidden in obscure laneways yet, but being true blue Singaporeans, we decided we could manage some outlet shopping.

We decided on the DFO (Direct Factory Outlet) next to the Melbourne Exhibition Centre which apparently carried some premium brands. It was also really close to city centre. 

We took the free City Circle tram to the stop right outside Police Victoria Museum. Suhua navigated while I snapped away on my camera. 

I love how seagulls fly about the highly urbanized CBD area. I enjoyed watching the birds through my camera screen (tried to snap them in flight but they’re too fast for me!) as we walked across the pedestrian bridge. 

DFO is to the right of this building. 

This place is huge! Every time we turned a corner we saw new shops, it was like a never ending stretch of shops and shops and more shops!!! 

After more than an hour of casual browsing, we were so exhausted that once we stopped for fruit juice and muffins, we felt that we couldn’t really walk any more.  

I didn’t buy much. Only deals that were too good to miss. 

Case in point: A Karen Millen evening dress that I saw in Singapore a few months ago selling ard S$700, going for AUD$149, in my size. Totally fitting. No alterations needed.


Such a good deal. Have to buy right? 

Day 0: Off to Melbourne

We are really getting into the mood to shop! 

Here we are, near midnight, waiting to board the plane to Melbourne, and the shopping has already begun! 

It's a midnight flight and we need to try and get as much rest as we can! 

Pretty, Light Tripod

Juz got a pretty violet tripod! Its ultra light and super compact! (As light as my ultra light umbrella!)

Going on vacation next next week and hope this will help me take more pix!

It's not going to be super stable when I mount my G11 on it, but it has this little triangular netting which you can hook at the bottom of the tripod, so that you can put something heavy like a bottle of water or a piece of rock to help stabilize it.

Very cool. But not sure how well it works so will have to be super careful abt that when I start using it!

Tks CSS for helping me get this. Having a natural fear of IT and/or camera shops in general, I would never have found this myself.

What's In A Pearl?

Is this what a pearl looks like in my stomach?

Horror of all horrors!

If you've been following my updates on FB, you would know my recent obsession with KOI.

Milk Tea with Pearls

I had one last night, but as usual, got sick and tired of chewing my pearls, and was feeling bloated anyway, so I took out one pearl and threw it into a cup of water and left it overnight. 

Well, suffice to say that I don't really like the look of what an undigested pearl may look like, and the thought of having tens of these somewhere along my intestines just makes me feel sick. 

And that really begs the question - what's in a pearl anyway? 

I think I will try and find out later. It's too early in the morning now and I need to have something healthy to eat and read my newspapers first. 

Later!