We have tennis tonight so this morning we spent a bit of time walking around Melbourne taking in a few sites and doing the sort of thing we do when we are in an overseas city.

First thing was to go and have a look at St Patricks Cathedral. The church is out behind parliament House and is Gothic in design and was built in the mid 1800’s from what we could see. It has some very well kept gardens surrounding and the exterior shows the signs of years of grime build-up from the city air.  Inside it has a vast ceiling and a very open feel and isn’t overly ornate.  It has been said that this is a place of quiet refuge in the city, a place where you can sit and reflect away from the bustle and noise, and that is exactly what we found. A beautiful old church, not overly ornate, but with some really interesting features, like carved angels looking down on you from the ceiling, a series of horns poking out between the organ pipes and a beautiful stained glass window on the northern wing.

From there we walked down past the Windsor Hotel, a grand old world style hotel, past Parliament House and then down Bourke St. There are so many old buildings (maybe just the facades, but at least some of the history is being maintained) within Melbourne. We walked as far as Elizabeth St, calling into a Scots Church, (very Scottish in its own way), and then we sat in the “Mingary”(Gaelic for “quiet Place”) a quiet refuge in the middle of the city set up as a place for reflection. Good thought but we didn’t feel it.  After there we walked a bit more and then through the arcades of “The Block” and its intricately designed mosaic floors, took photos for you Von. We then walked to St Pauls Cathedral.  Its a very different building to St Patricks. The inside is very busy, with a patchwork of black and white stonework, very dark wood and lots of dedication plaques. As we always do, in both St Patricks and St Pauls, we lit candles for all our family and friends, keeping you all in our thoughts and putting good karma out there for you all.

We then went over the road to Flinders St Station, a magnificent looking building from the outside that looses all character once you walk inside, a bit disappointing really! We then crossed the road to Federation Square.  An interesting public space, that is used by many locals to sit chat drink and eat. The buildings surrounding the Square are all more like sculptures than buildings. From there it is a short walk down to the Yarra where we saw many rowing boats out on the water, from single sculls to eights, it was good to see so much activity on the water.

We followed the river for a while and then walked back to our apartment along Batman Ave. We grabbed some lunch from The Press Club and then went back to get a few things ready for our departure tomorrow.

Our evening session today was delayed a bit due to the  Djokovic V’s Chiudielli, Samantha Stosur V’s Kristina Barrois and Lleyton Hewitt’s game against Donald Young finishing late. But it was  good results for Australia as Lleyton and Samantha both won and are through to the 3^rd round.

Our first match for the night was Roger Federer V’s Victor Hanescu. Federer was doing it very easy until the 3^rd set when there was a surprise guest to Rod Laver arena. Prince William entered the arena to a thunderous applause and cheering. It seemed to lift the Romanian. Although the scores don’t indicate it, 6 – 2 in the 3^rd, he made Federer fight for every game, taking many of them to deuce. We had seats up FF row up top and it was pretty warm, so at the first opportunity during the Karolina Sprem V’s Casey Dellacqua (Aust) match, at Deb’s insistence, we moved over to the good seats down below the press area. We finished up in row B seats 260 and 261, just up and across an aisle from Gary Lyon (of the AFL Footy Show fame). In front of us were two of the most hilariously drunk young guys we have seen for a long time. Deb, myself and Gary Lyon were in stitches of laughter with their antics. At one point they both brushed their teeth, tooth paste and all, but they had to share the tooth brush. Even the press photographers on court seemed more interested in the antics of these two than the match, about half of the cameras were focused on these guys at one point. Eventually they were asked to leave by security, they couldn’t understand why they were asked to move, but did so quietly anyway.

A little way into the Dellacqua game the Prince returned and watched the game until half way through the 2^nd set, when he and half the VIP section got up and left.

Anyway, Casey Dellaqua eventually won her game 7-6 and 7-6. It was a great game, very tense to the end, Spren seemed to be fighting off cramps for the last 3 games or so of the match.

All up our Australian Open experience has been amazing. The tennis has been exceptional, either in the fight in the matches or in the skill of the players. The top players really are class acts compared to the others.  And TV really doesn’t do the game justice, the speed and agility of the players doesn’t come through as it should. Anyway, I am sure we will be back for more in the future.