In Living Kiwi: A Week in Melbourne, Australia

Aaron's sister Bob is a pretty awesome competitor when it comes to bike racing. She won the Riverwest 24 (a 24 hour bike race in Milwaukee) three times in a row and a number of other races. The Cycle World Messenger Championships was in Melbourne this year, and Bob decided to sign up for it since Aaron and I are so close. One week in Melbourne and a week and a half in New Zealand.

Bob unpacking in their "granny flat" in Melbourne.
A granny flat is a detached section of accommodation
from the house.

Dan wasting no time in putting his bike together.

Watch after some pets for a free place to stay? Absolutely.

We found an amazing person to let us stay in her apartment for our week in Melbourne. She offered when she saw our request on Couchsurfing. Seems she needed someone to look after her pets so it worked out perfectly.

Very noisy budgies

The first night out we met up with our friend of a friend Jaimie. She showed us some awesome places around St. Kilda, a beach side artsy suburb of Melbourne.

Great meal at Claypots in St. Kilda. Jaimie used to work here.

Jaimie and Aaron outside Claypots

CMWC registration night at the Grub Food Van in Fitzroy

A couple members of the Tokyo team. The guy on the right is Tak.
He took a lot of pride in being the most "crazy Japanese man."

Walking to the velodrome

The Brunswick velodrome in Melbourne

The CMWC was a week long competition with
many small competitions each day

Bob's new Melbourne messenger hat

A Russian Orthodox Cathedral on the trail to the Velodrome

Big external light up baby (Brunswick St. in Fitzroy)

Southern Cross Railway Station in Melbourne

Walking along Brighton Beach

Sunset with freight ships on the horizon

The beach huts of Brighton Beach

View of Melbourne from Brighton Beach

Moon rising above the huts.
Tomorrow there will be a total lunar eclipse

Heading back to the city

The Docklands, start and finish point for the race

The starting point

Bob talking to our new Australian friend Josh

Tak and Bob ended up doing their start at the same time.
Tak is yelling, "I am crazy Japanese man!"

Bob at one of the checkpoints.

Shortly after this checkpoint her pedal fell off which led to her disqualification from the race. She said it was a hard race and a very confusing course. Each competitor had a manifest which they had to complete in under 90 minutes. Both Tak and Josh did not make the time frame. The main race is held the next day for all the people that finished in time.