ABSOLUT vox

Leonard wanted to do some shopping so we walked northwards to Melbourne Central (the city's northern station), which doubled as a large shopping centre. I insisted we have lunch at a small asian store on Swanston called Claypot King due to my craving for good congee. They have real nice asian soups there too, mmm ginseng.
Leonard's need for shopping unsated, we went onto Bourke St to check out the Myer stocktake sale. Several hours later we met up with my Melbournite tourguide friend Cindy for dinner at a contemporary Japanese bar called Horoki. The food there was amazing with the standouts being the roasted duck on eggplant, tuna carpaccio, salmon croquettes, and deep fried honey soy king prawns.
Cindy really outdid herself with her tour of the Melbourne bar/club scene. It was a class effort covering the entire city and I think Leo was even getting buggered from all the walking. We got taken to some pretty seedy looking dark alleyways (which I took photos of so I'd be able to show police where I got butt-raped come the next day). But that's the beauty of Melbourne: poke around in the dank, dark, dirty areas and you'll find gold. I mean, the pool lounge Charlton's is clean and nice on the inside but situated next to an adult theatre/Club X on the outside. Compare this to Sydney...yeah, butt-raped. Let's see what was covered: Long Room, Lounge, Equinox, St Jeromes, Charlton's, Amber Lounge, Shamiana (aka schoolgirl nights/seductive hostesses/sexy waitresses bar), F4, Loft, La La Land...jeez what a shocker. I'm sure there were heaps more but we covered so many I couldn't possibly remember them all. We saw Cindy off at Melbourne Central and headed back to Calendonian Ln to experience St Jeromes which was a real nice outdoor bar with an indie scene. Then more Cookie before calling it a night.

Day 3: Thursday 28th June
Breakfast at Melbourne Central's Me Too café bar, which, as a sidenote, has the best pumpkin soup I've ever tasted. Then we finally met up with the elusive Thai under the Melbourne Central clock (which in my opinion is an awesome meet up spot). We had lunch at a small Japanese take-out place off Swanston St with Dave.
We walked back down around Fed Square and Thai showed us the newly erected ferris wheel, the MCG and Rod Laver Arena. Then it was more Fed Square bumming at the cafés. Thai drove us down to the Chapel St, which was an entire street devoted to shopping, particularly clothing. Three Politix stores within 5 mins of each other...words cannot express the love. Unfortunately we couldn't find the Vodafone Chapel, which was rumoured to be in that area. Thai then took us to Chadstone, the biggest shopping centre in the southern hemisphere. Which seems about right judging from the outside of the place. Apparently it's so big it's become synonymous with the suburb name itself, hence the shopping centre is the suburb. :P
For dinner we went south-east to Glen Waverly and met Thai's girlfriend Melanie for hotpot. It was a much more asian place than any we'd seen before in Melbourne, as shown by the Happy Cup! I thought they went extinct! Seriously, that stirred a bubble tea craving like none I've ever experienced before. The food was great despite the chili soup base being spicy to point of almost being intolerable. BTW look closely at the photos to find immaturity.
Then more caféing (see why I've currently got café withdrawal?) and a deliciously thick Fraus (european hot chocolate) and finally a stop off at The Pancake Parlour. Kinda like our Pancakes on the Rocks except more old school and they have giant chess and a rocket ship that takes off on the hour or something haha.

Day 4: Friday 29th June
I decided to fly solo in the morning since there were a whole heap of things I needed to get done. Firstly, I needed to get the internet up and running in our room, which, after hassling concierge for two hours, I managed to get done. Then I needed to Facebook Alice in hopes that she had a profile and I could arrange a meeting in Melbourne before I left (yes I know, I know, this is my only case of Facebook stalking, promise). After sorting through over 50 emails, half of which was Mountains related haha, I went for lunch at a Shanghainese restaurant Cindy had recommended earlier which I have to say was pretty damn...decent. Haha damn it, can't let her always be right about places/foods being good. The xiao long bao was good, though not of a Crystal Jade level. Finally, on my to-do list was to experience the train system, Connex. So I took a train down to some random place (Lilydale I think?) and I have to say, the system worked flawlessly. The rides were smooth, quiet, and very accurately on-time, reminding me a lot of the MTR system. Then I caught a train back to Southern Cross Station as I heard it was newly renovated and architecturally pretty.
I met up with Leo and Thai at Melbourne Central for more caféing at Café Era. It was my first experience with a Hoegaarden and I love it. A beautifully smooth pale beer with a sweet honey aftertaste that sat very pleasantly. We headed up Russell St for dinner at a Korean BBQ called Seoul House which was delicious as all Korean food is. Mmm bulgogi sex. After some bumming back at the hotel room we headed downstairs to Loft where the clubbing scene was supposed to be raging (Friday is "asian night"). We didn't bother getting in; a long wait, a queue with a guy to girl ratio of 1:0, and a weird security guard dude who was flirting with Thai = the recipe for getting the hell outta there! At Thai's suggestion we went to a quiet little bar with a cozy friendly atmosphere for a few beers and a chat, which ultimately was a very nice end to a strange night.

Day 5: Saturday 30th June
Since tonight was clubbing night, we decided to take a breather and catch up on some much deserved sleep, waking up at about 1:30pm and meeting Thai at Footscray (Sydney's equivalent of Cabramatta or Flemington) for lunch at Dong Bo. Chili beef noodles! Not sure if it fully lives up to the standard set by Pho Tai but it's close. We drove to Hills Point shopping centre and had a brief escapade in the arcades. After failing hard at Guitar Freaks and getting whooped by high schoolers at 2Spicy we realised we were too old to remain part of that scene haha. Galaxy days are o-v-e-r.
Cindy met us at Melbourne Central and we took a tram to Lygon St for an Italian dinner at Il Gambero. Shit we ordered a lotta food. The pizza was fantastic and it was great to have dinner in an outdoors area. You know, except for the hobo that came up to our table pointing at a slice of our pizza while holding a pack of ciggies and a bottle of booze haha.
Over the course of dinner the topic of pre-drinks came up and Cindy suggested we go for some lychee wine which sounded awesome. The bar was on Lt Lonsdale called JWow and it was my favourite bar of the trip. Small, quiet, very cozy, it's walls were beautifully lined with bottles of vintage wines, the staff was helpful and friendly, and they had a projector of a fireplace on the wall which...was kinda warm haha. The lychee wine we had was Te Whare Ra, a 2006 Gewurztraminer which was spectacular. Very smooth, very easy on the palate with only a hint of alcoholic taste. Cindy's friend Jai joined us there for cocktails and when we were good and woozy we left the bar to go clubbing at BLVD.
Thai and I decided to walk it while Leo cabbed it with the ladies. It was only raining lightly so the walk was quite pleasant and we had some good chats. The scenery from the city to Southbank was very enjoyable. Using her plethora of connections Cindy got us into the club within 10 mins despite the massive crowd of people waiting outside (note: guy to girl ratio was heaps better). After a jaeger bomb, a black russian, a lemon lime vodka and some weirdo shot with a random 21st celebrator the night got very blurry very fast. Danced with some randoms, talked to some guys and some girls all of whom where very sociable, I seem to remember there was a smokin' hottie, and saying cheers to everyone with a glass in their hand. Yeah...to be honest I don't remember much else from that night. From what Leonard told me I was a loud and funny obnoxious jerk and I was freaking out that Cindy didn't get home safe and that her cousin May in Sydney would kill me when she found out. Bizarre. The next morning was weird. Firstly I took a heap of photos which I seriously didn't recognise. Bloody good thing I still had my camera with me. Secondly, I judged from the pizza box on our table I saw in the morning we stopped by a pizza place. Apparently I also cooked mi goreng stir-fry style in the authentic manner. Seriously, don't recall eating pizza or mi goreng...Great night haha.

Day 6: Sunday 1st July
Woke up at noon still incredibly tipsy and disoriented but otherwise...ok. Thai stayed over so at around 1pm Melanie came by the hotel and we went out to QV for lunch at Meshiya. I swung back to the hotel to help the fellas organise Newton's 21st present, went back to see JWow in daylight and cement its location in my mind, then went to meet the rest of the group around Melbourne Central (I think...memory still kinda fuzzy around here). Went by RMIT which in daylight looked like a bizzarro castle from a Disney movie. We drove to Brunswick for a short stroll around the area. Reminded me very much of Newtown, especially the whole Totally Weird Shit thing. :)
To cross off another item on my to-do list we decided to head southwards to St Kilda beach which was a very nice area. The sidewalks were lined with outdoor seating bars/cafés and the beach, although tiny in comparison to anything Sydney has to offer, was still very nice since we went at sunset. We stopped by one of the bars offering 2 for 1 but walked out realising I'd already gone hard the night before. Cool bar though, they had a backroom that was semi-outdoors and designed to resemble a rainforest.
Back to yet another café at Melbourne Central, this time Max Brenner, Melbournite style. Later on, Leo and I split to meet with Alice at Flinders St Station. Haha go Facebook! We had dinner at the Crown in a European grill called El Greco with her boyfriend Matt who was an extremely cool guy, great to talk to. We pretty much just sat around, ate, chilled, chatted, and caught up after not seeing each other since end of high school. It was great to see Alice again and to know she was the same cool chick we knew from the good ol' playing-pool-after-school days.

Day 7: Monday 2nd July
Check out was at 10am so we rushed ourselves in the morning to get out of the house and have a final breakfast at Issus on Central Place. Leo and I went our separate ways so I could complete my exploration and get thank you gifts for Thai and Cindy for being awesome and making our stay so great. I found out about a great chocolate place called Haigh's from the girls working at Politix and oh man, I loved it. Their peppermint dark chocolate is bootylicious!
I met with Leo and Dave at Southern Cross station and he drove us to have lunch at Docklands with his girlfriend Ti.  We ate at Medici...that is everyone else ate while I struggled to finish a soup after my huge breakfast not too long ago. The area is nice but overly quiet and undeveloped. It seemed like there was a lot of construction going on and despite its attempt to be the next Darling Harbour, Docklands was really missing a lot of people.
Ti offered to take us around the city so we took a tram from South Melbourne and finally took a look at the post office turned shopping centre, GPO.
Having been forced out of bed so early we decided to grab a coffee at Koko Black which apparently was the best chocolate café in Melbourne. The line was huge though so we went for a coffee on Block Place instead. We chilled out with Ti's friend Joe until Thai and Melanie joined us, then shortly after, we walked back to the hotel to grab our luggage and head to the airport. And then finally after a great 7 days we boarded our flight back to Sydney and resumed our mundane non-caféing lives. Time to move to Melbourne!
Great trip, very highly recommended and definitely ranked as one of my favourite chillax spots. I've still got three items on my to-do list: visit a Spanish bar near Fed Square called Movida, checking out the scene at Loft provided the ratio sorts itself out a bit, and visit the suspended 3m x 3m glass cube in Eureka Tower. Sooo...who wants to go back to Melbourne with me? :D