My Koala Tattoo | A tribute to Australia

April 4, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire6 Comments

When I was back in Canada, I told myself that I was going to get a koala tattoo at the end of my Australia trip.

And so, I did.

Three weeks ago, I went to Vic Market Tattoo and met with Kane Berry to get my tattoo. I chose to book with Kane because I felt his portfolio matched what I wanted the koala to look like, and it looks like he has done tons of koala tattoos as well.

I already had a maple leaf tattoo (ayeeee, Canada!) and while I do love it, I felt like it was lonely and empty. A few months ago, I thought – hey! Why don’t I make my koala hold the stem of my maple leaf?!

Stencil on!

Thank God Kane was able to make that happen! I was worried it wouldn’t work out but he spent about an hour going back and forth with designs to try to make the koala hold the stem. Eventually he did and it looks soooo adorable! I absolutely love it.

I think it took about an hour to finish and the pain wasn’t too bad. If you ever had a tattoo done, the process of wiping excess ink hurts more than the actual tattooing because the paper towel is basically rubbing against an open wound. The shading of the koala started to sting a bit towards the end as well.

I chose to have the maple leaf tattooed because I am proud to be a Canadian. But above all that, it’s a little piece of home I can take with me anywhere in the world. I love travelling (as you can probably tell) and it’s such a comfort to travel thousands of kilometers away from home but still have a piece with you. I thought I would leave Canada and move abroad, but after this experience, I don’t think I can ever leave Canada permanently.

That being said, I chose to have the koala tattooed on me because this is a once in a life time opportunity. It was on my bucket list to be live abroad and I’ve done that. I believe I won’t have an opportunity like this again and I don’t think I can pick up and move across the ocean once I settle down. I can move within Canada but probably not to another country. Australia was home to me for 6 months!

Plus, my maple leaf was lonely.

The end result! Fresh ink, not even healed yet. I love Kane’s idea of colour burst to bring out the koala a bit.

Thanks Australia!

PS: Apologies for the image quality here! I had these photos compressed three weeks ago but wasn’t ready to write this entry yet. I thought everything was okay with the compression as like every other photos I’ve shared but I guess not! I don’t have the original images anymore for me to re-compress and have them in a bigger size.

Last month in Melbourne

April 1, 2019March 26, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire6 Comments

No, this is not an April’s Fool joke.

Sadly, we are saying goodbye to Melbourne and our expected leave date is April 30th.

We don’t have any regrets leaving Melbourne earlier than expected – in fact, we’re happy!

Melbourne has been great and our original plan was to work however long we needed to save the money to travel the world. We ended up having enough money sooner than expected which is why we’re completing our contracts and heading to travel soon.

Plus, after settling down, we ended up missing our friends and family, and the nature. Melbourne is nice, but damn is it flat. We miss the mountain views, and the accessible hikes in Vancouver.

When we first arrived, we struggled finding a job because the Working Holiday Visa has strict limitations. A lot of jobs that I got a call back ended up declining me because they learn that I was on a work visa. In such a competitive market, a lot of companies wants to invest in a long term worker than a contractor. I was lucky enough to score a 6 months contract, but ultimately, Dan and I don’t want to go through that entire process either.

We’re also ready to settle. We want to go back home and focus on our careers and saving for retirement and a down payment for a home.

Moving to Melbourne was a super fun experience. And all in all, we don’t regret it one bit, even if it’s shorter than expected. Our relationship grew a lot, and I learned a lot about myself, personally and professionally. Did I also mention that I learned to cook while over here?! I also learned to live in a suburb and not in the city where everything was lively and always open.

So, what’s next?

This month, we’re hitting The Great Ocean Road and wherever else is left in Melbourne for us to visit.

Later, we’re flying over to New Zealand to visit my best friend, Kendel. I seriously can’t believe my best friend and boyfriend are going to meet live in person! They’ve met over video chats a few time but nothing like the real thing, right?

After that, we plan to visit The Gold Coast and Sydney. I’m debating if I want to try out surfing or not – it’s never been an interest of mine but I also don’t want to leave Surfer’s Paradise without having to try surfing!

Once we’re finally done with Australia, we plan to visit Vietnam, Thailand, Montreal and possibly Toronto.

All in all, it’s about 1.5 months of training and we should arrive back home just before July 1st! I’m super excited to start a new chapter back home.

The Grampians Trip | New to Melbourne Bus Tours

February 3, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire8 Comments

Hey, can you believe it? We finally got around to doing something touristy and leaving the city! It only took about 2 months to do so… lol.

On Australia Day (Jan 26th), we finally went on the long-awaited Grampians bus tour. I found this bus tour hosted by New to Melbourne on Facebook and it’s aimed towards travellers and budget travellers. We missed out on the early birds special and got the next tier which was about $65? I think early bird special was only $50 per person.

I mean… that is significantly cheaper than renting a car! I pushed Dan to join me on this bus tour because the reviews were great buuut… I think we’ll skip these bus tours going forward. We originally planned on doing two more tours with them but it’s not our style, despite the cheap prices.

I took a nap before arriving at our first stop, Beaufort, a small little town about 2-2.5 hours away from Melbourne downtown. It’s one of those towns with only one major main street as their downtown and everything is local. It was our first pit stop to grab some lunch and for the next 30-40 minutes or so, I just loved Beaufort. I don’t know why but I love small towns.

From there, it was only about 40ish minutes to The Grampians.

So, Grampians is like a national park in the state of Victoria and our first stop was Mackenzie Falls. It’s at the top of the park and let me just say… holy crap, it’s beautiful!

It’s a giant waterfall but the scenery and landscape were just so beautiful and peaceful. Everything was blue. The water stream was refreshing and cold on a nice 30 degrees day. It really was breathtaking and I don’t think I’ve ever seen something like this before.

We then hiked a bit further down to get away from the crowds.

Does anyone else like copying their significant other? LOL.

Unfortunately, the tour started later than usual and the tour guide had trouble sticking to the itinerary throughout the stops so Mackenzie Falls was only about an hour… like seriously?! Only an hour to experience this beauty?

So we hopped on the bus and visited our next stop, The Balconies that overlooks The Grampian, I suppose.

This was a mediocre stop. The view was great but definitely not worth cutting Mackenzie Falls short.

And ten minutes away was Reed Lookout (I think??? lol). This was literally the dumbest thing because she only gave us 20 minutes to experience this lookout, and the best lookout was 1km always. Like, it would take 15-20 minutes alone just to walk back and forth from the lookout to the bus.

Sorry! This panorama wouldn’t rotate T__T

The last stop at the bottom of the Grampians was this kangaroo park. Unfortunately, it’s weather dependent and it was a hot day so the kangaroo park was empty. I think that sort of stricken a chord with Dan because when you look back retrospectively, we didn’t have to rush all the stops and could’ve experienced a bit more.

The next and final pit stop was in a town called Ararat where we stopped for some dinner. We had Nando’s planned (since we get dropped off right in front of it after the tour) so we just ordered some fries and drinks at McDonald’s to keep us satisfied until Nando’s.

So, all in all, the itinerary was planned for 9am to 9pm and we got back into the city at 8:45pm despite having a late start… I mean, I disliked the tour enough for me to actually be happy to have it end earlier than anticipated.

Don’t get me wrong – The Grampians was a beautiful experience and trip but the bus tour thing is not us. And New to Melbourne could really tighten up their game.

The tour guide was late to greet us. The bus was late to arrive. The bus driver was haggard and needed to take breaks on the side of the road. We stopped at a hotel to pick up another passenger’s mom?! And every stop was cut short to ensure we arrive back into the city at 9pm.

Not worth it. Crammed in a bus, our legs were tired and our shoulders were stuff, and when we arrived at our stops, we barely had time to fully stretch our legs and enjoy the views.

Sure, it’s $50-65 but for a once in a lifetime experience, I think it’s worth it to chuck out some money to rent a car and do things to your own desire and not wait on anyone else.

Oh well… lesson learned for our next road trip!

My First Australian Open!

January 31, 2019January 28, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire7 Comments

Last week, I went to my first ever Australia Opening… actually, make it my first tennis game ever. If you don’t count any games I’ve watched my classmates play back in high school.

Dan has been doing some work at the AO and decided to grab some court tickets to catch this event. I didn’t know just how big an Australia Opening is until my colleagues were talking about it. When I mentioned that I’m heading there on Sunday, my colleague, Charlotte, was telling me how much I’d love the atmosphere and Dan thinks the atmosphere would be pretty cool for me as well.

We went with our roommate, Tiffany, and her brother, Tom. When we first arrived, we walked around the grounds filled with yummy vendor stands and shops.

I don’t know about you, but I absolutely LOOOOOVE visiting souvenir shops so when I saw the Fan Shop, I dragged Dan in. He did warn me that all the Australia Opening swag is hella expensive so just how expensive? A damn baseball cap costs $40 and all it has is ‘AO’ embroidered on the front.

We got tickets to Margaret Court and I watched some legendaries played. They must be legendaries but I had no idea who they were, lol.

After this, it was the Women’s Double.

After that, it was a break before the Women’s Single match. We went to this BBQ pulled pork vendor for lunch and made it back to our seats in time for the Women’s Single match.

So, prior to the Women’s Single match, the court was rather empty. But when this match was starting, the entire court was nearly filled seat to seat. I think this was the “title match” for ticket holders to Margaret Court.

I remember this match because everyone was talking about it! It was the match between Danielle Collins and Angie… something, lol. I don’t know the players but I believe Angie was world’s #2 and she was knocked out by Collins under an hour! At that time, Collins was #14 in the world.

The Summer Nightmarket

January 13, 2019January 11, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire6 Comments

The Queen Victoria Summer Nightmarket was one of the events that every Melbourian has suggested we attend. Even previous Working Holiday travellers told us to not miss this event.

We’re no strangers to nightmarkets; back in Vancouver, there’s several summer nightmarkets happening around the city. I try to go every year but at the end of the day, it’s more or less the same shit. We also hate crowds too.

After work, we trained over to Melbourne Central and walked up the Queen Victoria market. We wanted to keep it cheap so we limited ourselves to $25. I hate nightmarkets for the reason that it’s usually cash only – although, this nightmarket seems fancy enough that vendors have Square now.

Anyways, first impression – it’s massive and very crowded. The vendors essentially create a rectangle around you (with a few vendors in the middle), and in the middle is just a big seating area. Back at home, the nightmarkets had a few tables scattered around but most people just stand in one area and eat, or walk and eat.

What surprised Dan the most was how this vendor managed to have a stone pizza oven in the middle of this marketplace, lol. I must admit, it’s pretty impressive….

We also saw a bunch of people with this huuuuge mango thing so I made it a mission to find it and omg, it was legit only $5. I was expecting to cough up like $10-$12 for the thing because of its size but it was literally only $5 and nothing more.

Like, seriously… how do you offer this much mango for only $5? Tell me your secrets.

We also decided to have dinner at the nightmarket as well, and we both agreed on this pulled pork place. No regrets because it’s the best pulled pork nachos I’ve ever had. I kept on moaning as I stuffed my face, lol.

Overall experience? It was great and I’m happy to have stopped by and check it out but I don’t know why so many people hype it up. The food selection was mediocre and only had a few good options, and the goods vendor were all selling cheap knockoff brands.

But, the food was overall cheaper than I expected. I guess it’s not like at home where they gauge you for as much cash as possible.

Journal Entry #006

January 12, 2019January 11, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire5 Comments

Friday, January 11th, 2019

I can’t believe it’s almost halfway through January! January is one of those months that always flies by for me, regardless if my life is eventful or not.

I’m currently sick right now. I don’t know what happened but Thursday morning on my way to work, I was just hit with motion sickness that wouldn’t go away so I left work early to rest up. This morning, I woke up without the nausea but just sharp headaches and a very achy body. You know the type of achy-ness that comes with fevers? Where you feel like you’re an 80 year old old nanny and the aches just seeps into your bones? I have that right now as I type this journal entry, lol.

The good thing about being stuck at home like an 80 year old granny is the fact that I’m able to finally catch up on blogs, write new entries, and discover new blogs. I really want to keep consistent with my blogging this year and grow my blog.

I was looking through my Google Photos and have a back log of photos… so, here’s a photo dump!

Where are all my B99 fans?! This shirt is from Greyline AU and I just had to buy it after seeing the Instagram ad for it. I got one for Dan as well but his shirt says Amazing Genius/Detective lol.

Dan’s mom sent us pictures of Cooper and look at how big he has gotten in just two years! As you can tell from the picture, I’m a dog aunt. Cooper belongs to Tyler, Dan’s older brother.

Last Friday, we went on a walking ghost tour! This would be my third one (lol, I know right?) and it was great. I found Lantern Ghost Tours off Groupon but otherwise, I normally wouldn’t pay full price for these activities. The host, Jason, was very good and the tour was fun. A lot to learn about Melbourne and its criminal past.

The other two ghost tours I’ve been on was back in Seattle and Vancouver. For those who think it’s ridiculous… I honestly recommend trying a ghost tour… you may just get into it like I did! This was Dan’s first ghost tour and he said he had a great time as well.

Also, during the daytime, it was hella hot… like 42 degrees Celsius hot.

I’ve never experience this heat before. The moment I left my nice air-con office, I felt my eyes being dehydrated asap. It was a weird feeling.

I’m trying to cook more and save money instead of always ordering out. I tried this recipe I found online for spicy tuna avocado wraps and it was the bomb dot com. I ended up making the same thing 2 days later because it was sooooo good and hella easy and cheap to make.

That’s all from me! I’ll try to keep consistent with my blogging so I don’t have a backlog of entries and photos to spam.

Date Day at Melbourne Zoo

January 10, 2019 Claire @ Coffee with Claire2 Comments

A week before Christmas, Dan and I headed out to Melbourne Zoo on the weekend. Much to my surprise, it was Dan’s idea 🙂

I can count the amount of times I’ve been to a zoo on one hand, and the last zoo I was in was the Calgary Zoo (or Edmonton? – I can’t even remember…) back in 2012 or something. I haven’t even been to the Vancouver Zoo yet!

Straight off the bat what I loved about Melbourne Zoo was how easy it was to get there. It was about a 15-20 minutes tram ride out of the city… like what?! I’m not driving 1 hour to go visit a zoo?! It amazes me that such a big zoo is just outside the downtown core.

First stop was the Gorilla section of the zoo. I didn’t take any pictures because my phone camera is shite in that area and the gorillas were super far… but, here’s a selfie at the “Ranger’s Den”, lol.

We later came across the Butterfly House which… you guessed it, a house full of butterflies! I was a bit scared at first but after spending time there, they’re just harmless butterflies.

After the Butterfly House, we ventured off the the elephants and giraffes.

When I asked Dan to take a picture of me with the elephants… his response was “I got a picture of you with an elephant’s butt… and the elephant.” So, it’s only natural that I do the same when he wants a picture with an elephant.

Here’s me with a side profile of a zebra’s butt.

We also dropped by the koala home but this koala was too busy eating 😦

I think we spent about 2.5 hours at the zoo already at this point and we were just ready to get away from all the kids and grab some late lunch/dinner. So, we sort of just sped through the remainder of the zoo (not many sections left anyways).

Here’s our favourite part!

We stumbled across this “cat alley” with beautifully painted cat murals. I couldn’t resist getting some pictures with it, and best of all? No loud kids pushing and shoving, shouting, and being in the background (lol).

Here’s our little cat family, lol… I love how the brown cat is staring at Dan!

Of course, after passing through the cat alley, we made our way to the meerkat section. This is Dan’s favourite part of the zoo and I didn’t think I would like it too much but these little buggers stole my heart! Look at how cute they are!

I love souvenir shops so it’s only fitting that we make time to visit the souvenir shop on the way out. I don’t know what it is about them because it’s not like I buy a shit ton of things! But I just love grabbing at least one item from a cool place, and Melbourne Zoo was pretty cool.

We ended up getting a meerkat magnet that I can’t wait to stick to the fridge when we get back home to Canada!

All in all, I had a great date day and I’m very grateful for Dan to have planned the day and dinner out! It was relaxing and very fun to see all these different animals. Personally, I prefer zoos more than aquariums. I find aquariums to be very repetitive, and the zoo had a marine life exhibition but we breezed through it.

Coffee with Claire

the personal blog of a 20-something-year-old canadian

Tag: australia