Here’s a photo montage of our day at the beach last week, including a stop at a playground on the way there, G and L running as fast as they could up and down a huge hill, digging giant holes in the sand, and seabirds who were just hanging in the air, as the wind was so strong, they were getting stuck in one place!
New Grill and Kanga Bangas
Although our apartment has a great balcony/veranda, the AirBnb host just recently bought an electric grill, but she didn’t have time to put it together. Mike and the kids offered to do it for her. 🙂 One of the first things we tried on it were Kanga Bangas! Really! L and Mike thought they were quite tasty. 🙂
Vietnamese Food
The day we spent the afternoon at the pool, we were all super hungry afterwards. It seemed like the perfect opportunity to try a new food cuisine (similar to our Indian food experience in Glasgow!). We decided to try out Quan 88, a Vietnamese restaurant recommended by our AirBnb host. It was another taste experience for G and L, who were big fans! We shared chicken satay sticks, chicken spring rolls, curry puffs, fried wontons, and coconut rice. It was all very nice!
Back at our apartment, we had Lamington fingers for dessert — an Australian cake, made from squares of sponge cake coated in chocolate sauce and rolled in coconut!
Enjoying our apartment veranda — Reading and knitting
Gymnastics and yoga
Coloring and inventing gadgets
Chinese jump roping
Eating mangos
Watching the sunset and the moon rise
Last Thursday we spent the afternoon swimming and diving at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Center. It’s a HUGE facility with a 50 meter indoor competition pool, a 50 meter outdoor competition pool, a 25 meter lap pool, 14 diving springboards and platforms, a multipurpose pool, a wave pool, a water slide, and a spa, sauna, and steam room!
We spent the majority of our time in the wave pool, swimming laps, diving off the edge of one of the indoor pools, and using the water slide.
The waves are so strong they would knock you right over, which was super fun!
Time to try out the water slide! 🙂
Onto laps and diving! 🙂
We also got to watch a few girls practice their diving techniques — first on a trampoline near the pool and then on the platforms and springboards. One of them was even using a harness as she was doing multiple flips in the air before hitting the water with hardly a splash!
A quick run through the water jets …
A little fruit yogurt … and we were on our way! 🙂
The other day as we were looking outside our Elwood penthouse flat, we happened to see several skydivers floating through the air! We ran out onto the veranda as they floated gracefully down from the sky and then disappeared behind the trees.
A day or two later, we were heading to the beach and happened to be crossing the road just as a group was coming down from the sky, but this time we were standing right across the street from where they were landing! They basically had to direct themselves to land in a small stretch of grass right in between a fairly busy road and the ocean! Impressive!! 🙂
