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As I have previously said, on Friday evening we met a tramp, which was a highlight, but it is not all we did on Friday…

The day was spent (or should have been) searching for a vehicle. However, we got a puncture when we went to set off and the spare tyre in the Slavominator was one of those “get-me-to-a-garage-fairly-soon-but-pretty-slowly-cos-I-am-no-more-than-a-bicycle-tyre” jobbies.

So off to the garage we went. The mechanic there made the ubiquitous mechanics sharp intake of breath and told us it was unlikely to be ready before 4pm – “I’ve had one man go home crook” he said. What did he have? A cold? It was about 32 degrees C…

This put paid to much of our vehicle search, and the cars that we did get to see were in various states of disrepair, “If you could spend $2000 more, you’d be able to get something much better” we were told. I couldn’t.

Basically, all of the above put me in a fairly bad mood and I didn’t much feel like driving into the city. Drive we had to though, as Vicky had phoned (before the debacle began) earlier and we’d agreed to go to watch the open air movies with her in the Botanical gardens in Melbourne.

I’m glad we went.

Despite a small mix up regarding which botanical garden we were meant to go to (our fault), we got the tram from St Kilda into the centre of Melbourne and, using the directions from some friendly locals, made it to the gardens with time to spare.

The film was to be “Brokeback Mountain”, it will probably surprise anyone that knows me and has seen the film that I watched it, but I thoroughly enjoyed myself due to the location and ambience. The film itself, without wishing to go into too much detail, can best be described in two words… NOTHING… HAPPENS…

The reason it was so good was that we were watching it in a truly unique place, with a perfect backdrop. Melbourne at sunset is a beautiful place, and we were sitting in the park toview it. The best part, however, was when totally unexpectedly hundreds of huge fruit bats flew directly over us, silently, as it grew dark, and I found myself looking up more than at the screen. A memorable evening. The film itself was quite forgetable.

If you ever go to Melbourne you should watch a movie in the Botanical Gardens if possible, it is definitely worthwhile. They are putting on a Shakespeare production soon and we plan to go if we can (the tickets are quite pricey mind you so any help would be appreciated…)