Monthly Archives: September 2016

Handel Hood

Random Musings

As a regular Handelblog reader, you know Handel life is quite fascinating so I thought I’d give you an up close look at our neighborhood. Okay, I may have oversold that, but hopefully you’ll keep reading anyway.

Jon and I live in South Yarra, an inner south suburb of Melbourne. realestate.com.au describes South Yarra as “Polished, glamorous and prestigious, South Yarra is one good looking suburb, highly sought after for its proximity to the city and its luxurious lifestyle.” In other words, just like me. Heehee.

Map

Hood Map

We live in a single family house on a quiet street just a block off this busy thoroughfare, Toorak Road. We can walk to restaurants, shops, and more in just a few minutes.

Toorak Road

The South Yarra train station is also just a short walk away which has vastly improved my commuting options. I tried driving to a client in the outer burbs and found that taking a train to a bus was a much better option both for consistency in the amount of time it took and for the promotion of my mental health and stability.

Train Station

Jon checked out the numerous barber shops along Toorak Road and settled on this flash one. Only two more haircuts until he and the barber can stop speculating on if America will really elect Donald Trump or not.

Barber Shop

You may have heard that we like beer and two places we regularly visit to get the best of Australia’s beer selection are this bottle shop and Brother Burger.

Bottle Shop     Brother Burger

Brother Burger has the bonus factor of delicious burgers which Mike and Katy can verify.

To enable our lifestyle of drinking beer and eating burgers, we still run a few times a week. Luckily, there is a wonderful park nearby. Fawkner Park has lots of trails to choose from and only requires a couple of laps to get in our usual 4 miles (6.44 kms). I still can’t get myself to switch to running round number kilometer distances.

Park Park from Above

That’s a quick tour of our neighborhood spots. It’ll be summer down under soon, what better time to visit and see South Yarra for yourselves.

CA Dreaming

Travel

After getting back from our holiday to Port Douglas, Sara headed off to Darwin for another two week stint for work and I headed over to the Golden State to visit my mom and brother, Jeff.

I bought a relatively cheap ($1,100 AUD) round trip fare to San Francisco via Auckland, NZ.  It worked well to connect in New Zealand as it shortens the trans-Pacific flight time to a little over 11 hours.

I arrived into SFO after a robust 1 hour of vertical sleeping and proceeded to pick up my rental car and drive 3.5 hours up to Tahoe to see Jeff.  It was nice to be in the glorious California summer sunshine.  I had the windows down and the Amity Affliction (my favorite Aussie band!) blaring.  I made an important pit stop at Taco Bell since it’s had been too long since my last double decker taco. That night I got to play in Jeff’s softball game.  I was a bit rusty after not swinging a bat for almost 2 years, but managed to scrape out one hit in my 4 ABs.

The next morning we snuck in a quick 9 at the Tahoe City golf course before heading back down to the bay area to spend time with our mom.  We stopped at the In-N-Out Burger on the way down because California.   We got some good Mexican food (which is in short supply in Australia) in Pleasanton that night with mom.

We hung out with mom for a bit in the morning the next day and then hopped on the BART to head to an A’s game.  We got great seats right behind home plate for $30 (yay mid-week day game!).

Go A's!
Go A’s!

The weather was perfect.  That night dinner was another check-box item for me – Round Table Pizza.  As usual it didn’t disappoint.

An early wake up was in order the next day for a quick 18 holes of golf in Livermore.

Jeff keeping it in bounds, barely.
Jeff keeping it in bounds, barely.

Then we met up with mom for lunch before heading back up to Tahoe for Jeff’s co-ed softball game.  I didn’t get to play in this one, but it was probably for the best, since the right field fence was only 215 feet.  With that plus the high altitude it would be like taking candy from a baby for me to sock a few dingers.

The next morning it was up an at ’em to meet up with a childhood family friend of ours for a trip up to the top of Squaw Valley on the tram and a nice hike back down to the base.

Top of Squaw
Top of Squaw

We stopped for a quick lunch and then headed back to the Tahoe City golf course for another 18.  Sufficiently beat down from the day, we headed home and Jeff whipped up some awesome sausage quesadillas.

Jeff was back to work the  next day, so I was heading back down to see mom solo.  I stopped by to see Jeff and have breakfast at the Firesign Cafe and then proceeded down the west shore for the scenic route.

Emerald Bay on the west shore of Lake Tahoe
Emerald Bay on the west shore of Lake Tahoe

Also, I wanted to stop in South Tahoe for a quick game of $5 craps.  I was rewarded with a nice $65 payday after about 30 minutes of playing.  I even had the table to myself.  Made it back to the bay area in plenty of time for another nice dinner with my mom, Chinese food this time.

The next morning I got up and hopped on the BART again, this time all the way to San Francisco to head to a Giants game with a friend I hadn’t seen in a few years.

Looking good Darren!
Looking good Darren!

The weather didn’t disappoint and neither did the Giants.  $30 will not get you anywhere close to behind home plate for the Giants for a Sunday day game, but still not a bad view!

One of the best views in a baseball park.
One of the best views in a baseball park.

Again, more time with mom, this time with Thai food!

For my last day in town I helped my mom with things around her house and we took a trip up to Walnut Creek (where she grew up) to see what all has changed since she’d last been.

Then it was off to the airport for my flight back to Oz via NZ.  A great quick trip to the USA.