Left the house at 7.30 and headed for the city. It was unbelievably busy for early morning Sunday, lots of people and cars!! We first did Flinders St Station and along the Yarra River behind it, but as we only had an hour parking it was quick. Then another hour parking sport and wandered a few more streets. Another move to an untimed spot allowed us to concentrate on the Southern Cross train station and some of the Etihad Stadium behind it. In Europe one can wander the train station platforms, but here you have to have a ticket to get to the platforms, so some of the virtuals were unobtainable, until we used the 100-virtual capping button.

We then headed for the Royal Botanic Gardens with a view to having some lunch and a pleasant walk amongst the gardens and the munzees. Plans foiled as the gardens are near the tennis stadium, and there was no parking to be had anywhere! So we once again had to resort to the multi-cap.

Heading home we stopped off for lunch and food supplies for tomorrow’s barbecue and meals at the house, had lunch at 3.15!!!

Currently having a rest after our 9 kms today, and then out to Italian tonight for a munzee get-together.

This was our attempt to spell the word munzee using people at last night’s barbecue!

I picked up Helen &Gary just after 7 and we were in the check-in line by 8, after leaving my car in the long-term car-park and catching the shuttle bus to the terminal.

The plane took off at 9.50 and landed in Melbourne at 15.50, 3 hours later, lol. Picked up the hire car and headed for Coldstream and our accommodation. What a lovely place, everything laid on including the makings for a couple of breakfasts. Didn’t have much time though to look as we had a barbecue to go to with our fellow munzee clan members. The head of Munzee has flown over from Texas for the main event on Monday, so it was great to meet him and fellow clan members. Good food, good company and Nat and Eric have 2 babies like mine so I got to talk to them as well.

Even though its 20.20 at home it’s 23.20 here and should go to sleep as we are walking the streets of Melbourne CBD tomorrow.

Off to Melbourne for a week of munzeeing. The Big Event is the Australia Day barbecue at Brimbank Park. Still haven’t finished packing and I have to leave home in 2 hours, oh well, the list is half ticked, so should make it, LOL.

Here are the main areas we are heading for.

 Australia in emeralds Boomerang & heartBrimbank Park

Well today Helen, Gary and I parted ways. Helen and Gary off to do a coach tour of eastern Europe and myself to come home. However we did have a busy morning. Had to be at the Hamburg Fishmarket for 6.45 for the 4^th and final munzee event. McHenry had the job of escorting us along the Elbe embankment, scanning munzees as we went. He took us down the elevator into the tunnel that goes under the Elbe, which carries vehicular traffic as well as people. There are elevators that hold 2 cars, taking them down to and up from the tunnel. Currently it is only a single lane as the other is being repaired, so it’s one way in the morning and then back in the afternoon. The Fishmarket was a traditional place for fishermen to sell their wares, now it sells everything, including fish and fresh fruit and vegies. The stall owners actually call out and encourage people to buy their produce and there were thousands of people there, and some had obviously been there all night and were thinking about going home. There are live bands in the food hall (very loud live bands, lol),and even that time of the morning people selling & drinking alcohol. It was way too crowded to be able to see much!! Had breakfast of eggs & chips, and then said goodbye to the munzeers who we had seen over the last 3 days. Powerslice and Sundream had done a fantastic job organising it all. From there we went back to the stadtpark and spent an hour getting more ice munzees. Then back to the hotel to finish packing and check out. A train to Frankfurt was the next agenda item, but we all had to sit apart as the train was rather full and we hadn’t pre-booked our seats. Then at Hamburg I popped over the road to my hotel and Helen & Gary caught another train off to theirs. I wandered around the station for a little while capping munzees, then bought dinner and repacked my case and stuff ready for the trip home. Worked out the I walked 450 kms over the last few weeks, an average of 13 a day, including those that we spent a lot of time travelling in. Thanks for joining us on our travels and will catch up with you when I’m home again.

Today was quite a social day. The 2^nd event was breakfast which we got to at 8 and left about 9. Found a couple of the special munzees nearby and then on the train the the state park. This wouldn’t have taken too long, but it had been filled up with ice cube munzees, just a thick sea of them, so in we waded. We were still going at 6 when the 3^rd event began in the park, dinner if you wanted to eat, but the main thing was scanning special munzees and in exchange scanning everyone’s social munzees. We have 2 each, our personal ones plus Helen & I created one each specifically for those we meet on our European tour. It is a nice way to keep a record of who we met and the date. There wer about 70 attendees, and it did start raining heavily at one stage, but everyone moved undercover and the conversations continued. We did reach a milestone though today, our clan score has topped the 2 million mark, the highest score achieved so far, so that is great. We had a fantastic team of 10, and we had so much support from those at home, well done to them all, Eric is a great clan leader. Another late night, it’s nearly 11, and an early start tomorrow as we have the 4^th event, a breakfast and then a munzee walk, lol, what else would there be!!

Well we had a day of it today. Left the hotel about 9 and caught the train back to where we had left off yesterday. Finished off around the lake, found an ice field to clear up and then back to the main train station for that lot. It rained on and off most of the morning, so had brollies up and down which makes hanging on to a phone and battery charger as well a nice juggling trick, lol. Anyway it did clear up quite nicely with warm intervals when the sun appeared from behind the clouds. We wandered through the city centre, found ourselves standing outside Cartier capping, much cheaper than going inside, lol. We also found ourselves back at the town hall that Helen & I munzeed around last year. After lunch at the main station and a bit more street wandering we had a short hotel stay as we had the first part of the Hummel Hummel event to attend. After finding the venue we discovered the time had been changed and we were 2 hours early, so off again to the main train station and finished off the munzees around that. Well Helen and I did, Gary had all the ones we did last year to do as well, so he didn’t quite clear up. Back to the meet & greet event, and we met lots of munzee hunters from all over Germany and the Netherlands as well. We had a great time, scanning socials, chatting, and generally getting to know everyone. Scanned a few munzees on the way back to the hotel, as there are special ones out for the event. An early night tonight, it’s 10.30 pm, lol.