Gone on a Lucky Country

There is this great couple that recently moved to Sydney from Atlanta.  Their names are Mollie and Dan and their blog is here.  The reason why I bring them up is due to the fact that we have a date with them tomorrow night - a date I have been looking forward to for a month - A date to eat incredible food...

The idea hatched itself over some glasses of wine (could it have happened in any other setting?) - basically, the four of us love to eat really incredible meals in top restaurants and we are blessed enough in our lives to have the means by which to pay for these meals.  So, we decided to make a list of the top restaurants in Sydney (after all, we are in a foodie's paradise - why not take advantage of it?) and then eat at one every month.  Obviously there are going to be some hiccups in the plan as we will be in New Zealand for a good chunk of December and will need to skip that month; but the four of us are also pretty easy going so no rigid schedule is being adhered to.

This month, November, is our first month in action on this plan.  We chose the restaurant Aria (when I say we, I mean Mollie and myself - the poor guys are just arm candy for this project!) which is located just before the forecourt of the Opera House and has a lovely view of both the Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge.


The restaurant is owned and run by celebrity chef Matt Moran who is most recently famous for guest-judging on the third season of Masterchef Australia.  Side note, if you don't download and watch this show, you should.... I think it's better than the American version and that's really saying something...

As you might have guessed by now, I'm more than a little excited about our dinner there tomorrow night.  I think we've all agreed to go with the tasting menu (always my favourite way to eat since you get to try lots of things) and with good reason.  Check this baby out:

Hello all you eager blog readers!

First off, I want to congratulate the little town of Manchester, NY for bravely stepping into the breech left by the absence of South Korea - You are the number five city that visits my blog!  Hurray for you!

Secondly, I want to talk about the last leg of our Christmas trip.  Thredbo was gorgeous - the mountains were stunning of course; but what really made the stay there so great was the level of relaxation that we were all able to reach by the end of our stay.

There was plenty of hiking of course (like when Joe started at the bottom and climbed to the top on the most difficult track); but mostly I remember the spa treatments, the monopoly games, the yummy dinners and the evenings spent (in one room or the other) drinking wine and talking.  We decided to extend our stay there by an extra day and it was the best decision that we made the entire trip.  We stayed at The Denman which was staffed by a team of the most friendly and wonderful people I had encountered on the trip.  (So nice, in fact, that they did not charge us for a bottle of wine from the mini-bar that we accidentally broke.)

Joe and I went on a ski-lift for the first time.  I expected him to be a nervous wreck since he has a fear of heights; but he ended up being fairly calm.  The ride up was easy-peasy for me; but I surprised the both of us by being more scared on the ride back down than he was! I think I need to visit Cedar Point the next time I am in the States so I can ride some coasters and get back my usual ambivalence to high, dangerous places!

Anyway, here's some photos...  They don't even begin to do any justice to these incredibly beautiful mountains; but at least they can give you an idea of what it looked like!

Per the usual, I've returned from somewhere with far too many photos and probably not enough witty prose to go along with them.  I'm just going to write the whole story, plug the photos in and keep my fingers crossed.

After my homesickness leading up to Thanksgiving (I know, I know, you have no idea what I am talking about since I never did end up writing a post about Thanksgiving) I was looking for a way to mitigate any sort of celebration or expectation of celebration for the Christmas holiday.  Much like my old industry in the States, the entire country of Australia seems to shut down from Christmas to New Years ((and in some cases two weeks into January) They call it the "Silly Season")) so we were going to end up with about a week and a half's worth of vacation in a city that had virtually ground to a halt.  I didn't need all that down time to get me thinking so we decided to take a vacation.  I started looking a while back for some little shack or cottage on a beach somewhere where we could have a nice week away. I soon discovered that it is nearly impossible to book ANYTHING near a beach for the Christmas holidays - ah yes, and also they seem to charge double over the holidays.

Luckily, our intrepid friends Cristin and her Partner in Crime were also looking to get out of Sydney over the holidays so we decided to holiday together.  We settled on a trip length of 4 days - 2 days in a little historic town  called Beechworth and the remainder of the time in a ski town at the top of the Snowy Mountains called Thredbo.

Joe and I both took the day off work on Christmas Eve - P.I.C (Partner in Crime mentioned above) had to work till noonish so that gave me the morning to pack and get the apartment settled. P.I.C and Cristin picked us up around 2 and we started the drive south.  The drive was pretty unremarkable at the beginning - of course there was much talking and laughter - also some podcast listening and snacking.  I first realised that we were not only going south; but also, back in time, when we stopped for petrol the first time and I saw the pumps were circa 1970.  We stopped for dinner and shopping in Gundagai.  It was a cute little town with an IGA (which was our main reason for stopping there).

After we stocked up on lots of wine and food for Christmas day, we wandered down the main street to "the local" hotel which was surprisingly crowded for a Christmas Eve evening.  We ordered our fish and chips (and, of course, I'm the one with the Corona) and then found a table outside in the courtyard.  As we sat there, we began to notice that people were walking to the hotel from all over the town - it was almost as though the entire town was coming together to celebrate Christmas Eve at the pub.  Also, it should be noted that these folk were showing up in what was obviously their Christmas finery.  We ended up eating rather quickly and then moving on as we felt further and further out of place the longer we sat there.  It was extremely obvious that we were "not from around these parts"and it felt a bit like showing up at a huge party and being the only people that weren't invited.

In Beechworth, we had booked ourselves into a lovely Bed & Breakfast called Barnsley House.  Cristin and I were seduced by the pictures of the rooms on the website - claw foot tubs, private patios, afternoon tea and a bright sunny conservatory just perfect for reading.  After I booked the room, I got a very nice e-mail from "Rod & Barry" informing me that they would be gone on Christmas Day visiting family and that our food was pretty much up to us.  They would make us breakfast of course; but it would be early.  No problem we thought - there are little fridges in the room so we would just buy some groceries and have some snacky sort of meals.

When we went into the IGA to stock up we were slightly horrified to realise that there were only 3 types of meat in the deli case - the whole store was really operating under the umbrella of "slim-pickins".  We called Rod & Barry to check if there was a BBQ we could use - there was not.  We asked if we would be able to access some plates - we would not.  It was around this time that they started referring to Christmas being a "limited service" day.  This did not bode well.....

We checked in very late much to the disapproval of Rod and Barry (both wearing shorts and house slippers - very strange).  We were reminded several times about the early breakfast and told that they needed to leave for their families house by 9:30am sharp!

Admittedly, the house was completely gorgeous - everything was done up perfectly down to the last detail.  It was in a bit of a dodgy neighborhood; but since it was enclosed in a high dense hedge it wasn't really noticeable after you pulled in.



The next morning it was up early for breakfast - there was one other couple staying at the B&B.  They were from Melbourne and were there for Christmas with his family as he had grown up in Beechworth.  They were easy and fun to talk to.  We must have been lingering a bit too long over our coffees; because Rod came over to the table to tell us that we needed to finish up and vacate the dining room so they could lock-up and leave. It was right around that moment when I realised that they were locking the door that led to the back of the house (which included the kitchen, the dining room and that gorgeous conservatory).  We were then left with just our rooms and a small "Guest Lounge" to our disposal.  We settled in to the lounge to watch a movie - there was nice selection of DVDs that were for guest use; but we opened them only to find that all of the disks had been removed and replaced with small stickers that read "Ask Rod or Barry for assistance".  They really were living up to that stereotype of fussy gay couples.  Thankfully I had downloaded some movies onto my laptop so we were able to watch "Love Actually" (albeit on a very small screen).

Just a warning - this will most likely be incredibly long, boring and rambling as I am determined to catch up and write about the last week and half all in one post...  Strap in, this may get bumpy....

What a title right?  I mean, how could you not read this?

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