After a fantastic month in New Zealand, we have now moved on to Australia. We finished our stay in New Zealand with an outstanding concert by the choir from the Tiffin Boys School of Surrey, England. We had seen the choir at Evensong at the cathedral in Auckland earlier in the month. As they were on tour, we were fortunate enough to see this group again (this time in a full concert) at Christchurch Cathedral in Christchurch. This group performs regularly with the British National Opera and we purchased a recording of them performing Carmina Burana with the London Symphony under Sir Colin Davis. Stephen Toynes, their director has a very impressive resume which includes workshops with choruses at the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. Thus, you can see that this choir is of an extremely high calibre. Major selections on the program included Leonard Bernstein's Chichester Psalms and Benjamin Britten's Behold The Lamb. The choir performed for a packed house at the cathedral. The bonus was that the concert was free. They were accepting donations for Ronald McDonald house at the end of the concert.We were up out of bed, way, way, WAYbefore the crack of dawn on Sunday morning, March 1, to catch our Air New Zealand flight to Melbourne, Australia. After an uneventful flight, we were really excited to be greeted by Trevor's cousin, Glenda at the Melbourne airport. Glenda is a naturopath and is married to Geoff. Glenda's daughter, Nicki and son, Darren also live in Melbourne and Cameron, the basketball star is still living at home. Geoff has two older children, as well whom we have not met.
We picked up our new car immediately after landing and met Glenda, Geoff and Nicki for lunch at a terrific cafe at Fitzroy Park in the downtown area of Melbourne. We were quite zonked from being up so early but it was so exciting to be back in Melbourne that we didn't notice how tired we were. Melbourne had really hot weather for the weeks prior to our arrival so everything is quite dry here. By hot weather, we mean temperatures that soared to 40 and 45 degrees. Wow! Probably just as well we were in New Zealand during that time. It has cooled off for now but comfortable, warm temperatures are expected.
We've settled into our new digs at Punthill Apartments in Burwood, Melbourne. This apartment is in the suburbs but very centrally located and very handy to everything. We're only about 20 minutes drive away from Geoff and Glenda. We stayed at this same location when we were in Australia so it is nice to be in familiar surroundings. Stay tuned for more news from Melbourne.
Photos Are As Follows:
1. Melbourne Skyline
2. Melbourne City Centre
3. Cousin Glenda and Geoff @ Fitzroy Park Cafe
4. Glenda With Daughter, Nicki
5. Trevor, Lorraine and Geoff in Fitzroy Park
6. Geoff, Glenda and Trevor in Fitzroy Park
7. Geoff At Home
8. Cameron, The Basketball Star At Home
9. Glenda With Auntie Stephanie's Knitted Dolls
10. Cameron And Geoff With Auntie Steph's Dolls
