Anyone for Tennis ?

One thing we have learnt in our eleven months in Melbourne is that above all states in Australia this oe is sports mad....with the Commonwealth Games, AFL, Grand Prix, World Swimming Championships coming soon, and of course the first tennis Grand Slam of the year. Given our desire to fully embrace life in Australia we took the boys and Ella to the tennis on Friday last week and were wise enough to go indoors to start with at the Vodafone arena as the heavens opened for part of the day.

We saw a couple of very enjoyable matches with Novak Djokovic (No 9 seed) and also Amelie Mauresmo (No2 seed) as well as having a good wander around all the outdoor areas. Having done wimbeldon a few time it was refreshing to see the space and lack of long queues even though there were 40,000 people there. The other thing we have learnt about sport in Victoria is that it is highly valued in society and priced to reflect that.....ground passes for the whole family in total amounted to £30 and you could simply walk up to the ticket office on the day if you wanted to buy...queue stretched for at least six yards....SO refreshing!!!!!!....maybe I was never a good queue inhabitant!!!

The boys walked away with two giant tennis balls to frame their first visit to a grand slam tennis tournament....Nikki walked away with a beach towel (make of that what you will) and Dad walked away with the bill for it all!!!!!

Anyway can thoroughly recommend for all you tennis fans tired of queueing / praying for Wimbledon tickets that you plan a trip down under to Melbourne.