Riding the Melbourne Star – at last
25 December 2013 | Places
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Melbourne’s big ferris wheel is finally back in operation. Back in 2009 – after I’d been for rides on the London Eye and the Singapore Flyer – commented on the sad story of Melbourne’s version. It opened on my birthday – 20 December 2008 – and shut down just 34 d...
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Schottenfreude – incredibly useful German compound words
23 December 2013 | Culture
The Germans are experts at stringing words together to produce interesting – even quite necessary – words of often quite incredible length. I mean why say ‘lover’ or ‘partner’ when you could much more accurately say that she’s your Lebensabschnittpartner, ‘the person...
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Interesting Hotels – for beaches, bikes & exhibitionists
22 December 2013 | Culture
When I’m looking for ‘interesting’ (which could also be read as ‘expensive’) hotels I often use the Tablet Hotels website and booking operation. Tablet’s on-line magazine regularly features interesting categories with an assortment of places that fit the definition. ...
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Ring Postscript – the conclusion of lots of opera
17 December 2013 | Culture
I posted a couple of weeks ago about how I was going to a lot of opera, the Melbourne Ring Cycle, 16 hours of Wagnerian music spread over four days. Toss in the necessary rest days and it takes a week to get through. I could equally accurately title it Maureen’s ...
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Goodbye Holden Cars
13 December 2013 | Transport
▲ Me in 1977, driving a Holden GTS up the winding road to Arthurs Seat along the coast from Melbourne. (photographer Adrian van Valen)
It was the iconic Australian car. The first FJ Holden rolled off the assembly line in 1948, but in four years times (so just a y...
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