sooyindotcom

14 September 2005

We woke up bright and early on Wednesday as I had planned breakfast at the Observatory Café @ Royal Botanic Garden. We took a short chilly walk across Southbank to Flinders Station (yeahâ?¦we didnâ??t know that tram tickets could be purchased on the tram itselfâ?¦grrrâ?¦) and caught a tram to the Royal Botanic Garden. We got off a stop early along St. Kilda Road and took a 20 minute walk across the park. Even though it was still quite early, we passed by people jogging and walking their dogsâ?¦what a nice way to spend the morning! The weather was, as usual, chilly, but the sun was out and it felt good to be breathing in the crisp, clean air.

Upon reaching the café, we were faced with our usual dilemma…what to order? There were trays of muffins and cakes, and not to mention all the other items on the menu! In the end, we went for toast and eggs sunny side upâ?¦hubby had his with bacon and mushrooms, while I had mine with just mushrooms. After paying, we headed to one of the tables outside to enjoy the weather while waiting for the food to be served. I spotted two dogs tied to the chairs outside, one of which was a Jack Russell terrier. The two dogs were so obedientâ?¦just sitting there, waiting for their owners to finish their brekkie. So absolutely cute that I couldnâ??t resist snapping a few photos!

Breakfast arrived and it smelt wonderful. Steaming hot, still! The toast was slightly burnt on a griddle pan, and the mushrooms were so tasty. Hubby had hot chocolate tooâ?¦a perfect balance to the cold weather. Needless to say, we quickly polished off our breakfast before it turned cold! With breakfast done, we took a quick stroll in the herb and vegetable garden behind the Observatory to take some photos. While searching for the way out to St. Kildaâ??s road, we made a quick stop at the Shrine of Remembrance to take more photos…the pine trees lined up in a row made such a pretty picture!

Next stop: Bridge Road. On hindsight, I didnâ??t quite enjoy the stroll along Bridge Road, mainly because I wasnâ??t that interested in buying shoes and clothes (most of the sizes can’t fit me!), so we ended up walking past most of the shops. There were quite a few interesting ones though…I remember one store called Garfunkel that has the loveliest evening dresses. I did try one or two on (pink, of course), but as expected, it didn’t fit. Or probably I didn’t have enough on top to fill the bustier…hehe…=) Hubby was on the lookout for a jacket, so we did go into some men’s clothing stores, but he didn’t find anything suitable. I managed to buy three handbags from Nine West though! I bought one pink…well, fuschia, one, and two smaller ones in the same design, in pink…oops, sorry…fuschia…and turquoise.

By then, my shoes were giving me problems again. I didn’t want to spoil any more of our plans for the day, so we started hunting for a pair of sport shoes to save my poor feet (and considering how much walking we’ll have to do tomorrow on the Great Ocean Road tour, I don’t think I would survive in these boots!). We found a sporting goods store which had lovely light pink (yes, it has to be pink!) sneakers by Sketchers. After trying on two other pairs, I finally decided on the pink and beige Sketchers pair that had Velcro straps. I actually preferred the other pair (Puma) as it had more padding in the insideâ?¦it made my feet feel so comfy and cocooned, but it also cost a good $40 moreâ?¦so Sketchers it was.

With my feet in my new comfy shoes, we continued our walk along Bridge Road until we reached Richmond Hill Café and Larder, our lunch venue. We were lucky to get a table as the place was totally packed with the lunchtime crowd. There was a small shop located at the right of the main door selling pasta sauces and biscuits which I presume were made by the cooks at Richmond Hill. Cookery items, books and even jazz cds were also up for sale! Further inside was a room filled with cheeseâ?¦what is it called? A cheese cellar?!? Anyways, I got a whiff of the strong smelling cheese went I went near that room, so I didn’t dare to venture inside…hehe…=)

The waitress left us with the menus, and we took some time to go through the long list of breakfast and lunch items. We were still quite full from breakfast, so I decided to order something light: a Catalan style tomato bread, while hubby went the healthy route and had Caesar salad. My tomato bread was simply lots and lots of pureed tomato mixed with a little bit of red capsicum on toast, scattered with strips of proscuittoâ?¦a satisfying meal for a tomato lover! The Caesar salad looked delightfulâ?¦instead of croutons, they sprinkled some bread/biscotti-like chips on top, and what we initially thought was sour cream turned out to be a poached egg! Yummy! I think one of the waiter got abit suspicious looking at me snapping photos of the food and writing notes in my little notebook…he ambled over and asked what were the photos for. I should’ve been naughty and said that I was doing a review…hehe…maybe we might’ve gotten our dessert free!

Oh yeah…dessert. How could I forget? Best part of the meal! Hubby and I shared the “Chocolate Pot with Orange Shortbread, Chocolate Chip & Orange Créme” dessert. The chocolate was in a small espresso-like cup, and it had some alcohol drizzled on top. The orange créme was slightly sour and it went perfectly well with the bitter-sweet chocolate mousse. The shortbread was buttery and gosh…one spoonful of chocolate mousse coupled with another spoonful of the orange créme on top of the shortbread…wow….! The burst of flavour in your mouth coupled with the slightly rough texture of the orange créme, the smooth mousse and the melt-in-your-mouth shortbread…followed by a slightly burning sensation in your throat as the alco kicks in…*swoon*.

After lunch, we took the tram down to Chapel Street for more shopping. Unfortunately, the weather didnâ??t hold out, and it started to drizzle while we were there. Chapel Street had more posh looking shops compared to Bridge Road. Although I had a list of shops that I wanted to visit around that area, I only managed to go into Dinosaur Designs, a shop selling home wares and jewellery made of colorful resin-like material. Extremely expensive though! By 5pm, we were so tired of walking that we decided to take a rest at a nearby food court before proceeding to Misuzu for an early dinner.

A tram from Chapel Street took us back to St. Kilda Road, and another connecting tram along Sturt Street brought us almost to the front doors of Misuzu. Misuzu is apparently a very popular Japanese restaurant that offers good cheap food. It spanned 3 small shops, and the deco differed in each shop. From the window, it looked as if one of the shops was decorated as a lounge/bar, while the other had proper eating tables. Later, we found out that each of the shops had different names! Misuzu was actually one of the shop (not the name of all three!) that serves ‘village style & takeaways’, while Umami serves ‘fine food, regional sakes & wines’, and the last one, called Umami Dining Room is a lounge. Well, confusion aside, we were lucky to get one of the last 2 tables in the restaurant, the rest were either reserved or occupied. From the review that I had read earlier, the three recommended dishes were the miso soup, beef teriyaki and Seavegie Soba Noodles so we ordered just that! I was feeling a little greedy, so I put in an extra order for a plate of dumplings. *stomach rumbles*

Considering how full the restaurant was, we didnâ??t have to wait long for our meal. The Gyoza came out first, together with the Miso soup. Hubby said the Miso soup was good. As for the Gyoza, it was generously filled with meatâ?¦and minced ginger! Lots and lots of ginger. It wasnâ??t very spicy (you know how ginger gets abit spicy, especially young ginger), but it was quite a surprise as the ginger usually comes sliced up together with the soy sauce. Nevertheless, it tasted pretty good.

The main course was served soon after. Hubbyâ??s Beef Teriyaki looked really colorfulâ?¦itâ??s not the usual fare that you get in most Malaysian Japanese restaurants where the meat is served separately from the rice. This one was served in a bowl with the rice slightly soaked in the teriyaki sauce and it had capsicums and zucchini (I think) that were fried together with the beef. The sauce tasted slightly different from the usual teriyaki sauce, but it was a good kind of different…slightly sweet and salty and sticky! As for my Seavegie Soba Noodlesâ?¦well, itâ??s a vegetarianâ??s dream meal. Four types of seaweed in a tuna-seaweed soup. Hearty and hot, it was a perfect meal for a cold night. In addition to the seaweed, there was also bok-choy and zucchini slices in the soup. I could only finished about two-thirds of the contents, but I definitely enjoyed every bite! We also ordered crème caramel to end our meal, however, I left it to hubby to polish of most of it while I picked at the fruits.

As the restaurant was located in the middle of a residential area, we had to wait quite long for a tram. By then, coupled with the slight rain and wind, even my three layers of clothing wasnâ??t enough to keep me from shivering! When the tram arrived, we thankfully climbed aboard and headed back to the hotel. Back at Crown, we took a walk outside the promenade to watch the nightly (and hourly, starting from 8pm) display of fire from the eight high columns along the Yarra River banks. It really is a spectacular sight, even more so when you are standing near enough to be blinded by the bright flame of the fire and also feel the heat every time it blazes out from the columns!

On the way back to our room, we got distracted by the display of cakes at Café Greco, and decided to get a slice each. I went for my usual predicatable choice of Black Forest, while hubby chose the Tiramisu cake. While waiting for our orders, I started taking photos of the cakes, and to my surprise, this sour-faced lady at the counter reprimanded me for taking photos! What theâ?¦? Put up a sign if you donâ??t want people taking photos! Hmmpph. Anyways, the cakes ended up looking a whole lot better than it tasted. And Iâ??m not being biased. Heh.

After a short rest, we proceeded back down to the ground floor to take a peek at the Casino. There were so many people trying their luck at the different card games and gaming machines. There were Baccarat tables, blackjack, roulette, even horse racing and some type of wheel-of-fortune thingy. I had only brought $15 (yes, you read correctlyâ?¦$15. Hey…I plan to spend most of my money shopping, not gaming!) down to the casino with me, but since we didnâ??t feel like playing with the gaming machines, and the lowest bet for roulette was $5, we left after taking a walk round the whole casino. Before going back to the room, we stopped awhile at the main entrance to the casino to watch the light show and musical fountain that is shown nightly. It really was a magnificent sight…the whole ceiling was made up of crystal-like strands of light that changed colours and hues according to the music. We were not the only ones admiring the display…there were plenty of people standing or sitting along the steps, all craning their heads to watch. Back at the hotel room, we quickly washed up and got into bed asap for some much needed rest as we needed to be up by 6.30am the next morning to catch the connecting coach at 7.30am for the Great Ocean Road tour. Night, peeps!

For more photos, go to Photoblogum!

Want to give these places a try?

Richmond Hill Cafe & Larder
48-50 Bridge Road, Richmond, Melbourne
Tel: 9421 2808

Misuzu
3-7 Victoria Avenue, Albert Park, Melbourne
Tel: 9699 9022

Observatory Cafe
Royal Botanical Gardens, Birdwood Avenue, South Yarra, Melbourne
Tel: 9650 5600