bittersweet aviation.

i am writing this from england. so yes, i bit the bullet and took flight from beautiful melbourne. in my thoughts and feelings, words cant describe the time i've had down under in my ten month residency, but I guess a few fitting adjectives would be AMAZING because apparently pommy's always say that, or it could be just me, AWESOME because this is australia and 'when in rome', and ADORE because it starts with A and i think the city actually has a little bit of my heart & soul.

But before I spread my wings, I had a few more things to do up my sleeve which i'll let you know about now. Firstly I went to a club called Revolver aka 'Revs' followed by someone proclaiming 'aww noo not reevvss!' basically it is a not so posh club that opens until not only the very early hours of the next day, but about about 11am the next morning, or sometimes not closing at all and simply carrying on until the next night through. http://www.revolverupstairs.com.au. absolute. must. experience. its pretty famous with the melburian locals. so off i went and partied and met new friends dancing away at 9am. You will be warned away from this venue but good things come out of revs... my new found friend, angus edward, pretty much had a freakish amount in common with myself and so we followed this mitten-dancing rampage with a cultural day trip of photography and gallery viewing. We went to the NGV (national gallery of victoria) to see an exhibition called 'Timelines' which was a beautiful fuse of photography & time and then wondered through more engaging australian modern and historic artwork. We met up many more times and still talk today, the moral being, revs brought me friendship, fun, art & photography so it cant be that bad can it :)

Soon after it was time for the Melbourne Masquerade Ball. This was set up and run by my friend Ryan Gray who I went to Falls Festival with earlier in the year, and his close friend Samuel Hawkins who sadly lost their mothers to cancer. They created this yearly event to raise money for the Cancer Council of Victoria. I purposely didn't fly home before this event as i know how much it meant to all friends involved and i wanted to support the cause too. It was a sold out event and held at the elegant Melbourne Town Hall, raising a fantastic $25,000 this year. everyone got their tux's and ball gowns out, donned the masks and had a great night. well done guys, you've created something very special!

Before I left i wanted to break into another state, this time South Australia. Lisa, who i went road-tripping with to Sydney suggested we jumped back in the car again and headed for Adelaide, or more familiarly named, RADelaide. We got our mate Meagan on board, packed a bag and all headed out for a 5day adventure. Our first stop that evening was at Warrnambool (which i couldn't pronounce for the life of myself) where we checked in at a corny motel, splashed around at beach in the dark and visited Cheeseworld, yes, Cheeseworld! it does exactly what it says on the tin. I actually really liked this little bizarre place. Driving onwards, we refreshed in a delightful english tearooms in Port Fairy, i think i might have persuaded that detour! Next stop was Mount Gambier, home to the bluest of blue lakes and lots of pretty sink-holes, we got very wet here, mount gambier liked raining that day. We stayed that night in the 'caravan of courage', an awesome retro little caravan in some bogan park, very cosy. Then headed off through Robe, famous for its seafood, hence, we dined on fish and chips and walked it off along the picturesque seafront. A long voyage later along a single road that goes on and on and on into the horizon with nothing but road kill and little australian farm windmills to amuse & charm the mind, we got to adelaide. That night, due to a convenient advert we had seen on the ancient caravan television the night previous, we got a cheeky deal to stay in the Stanford Plaza Hotel in the heart of the city (obviously we had to sneak an extra person into the room though on the sly to meet the deal- requirements), i did say that it was cheeky. We had a night of luxury, food & drinks in the room, a Spa, Sauna and then headed out in the city to some pubs & bars. Some advise: never go to the 'hindley' street end, no, no, we we alerted to avoid this end and thought what the hell it cant be that bad, we were practically running back up, in a holding-hands-scared-for-our-lives-type-manner within 10mins of venturing down. its scary! stick to the 'Rundle' street end of the strip, much nicer. The next day we had to sadly vacate the Plaza for the opposite side of the accommodation scale, a campsite in the bush, we took a tent with intent to use it one night, so we did. It was actually really charming and relaxing (after we put one tent up, took it down, and then put another tent up) we were right by a stream which we followed and found a Koala in the tree, we did a little song+dance for it, but didn't share our enthusiasm. After finishing playing & climbing over lakes, trees, getting in contact with mother nature, etc, we scrubbed up and went out in Glenelg which happened to be 'the Queens Birthday' public holiday. Glenelg is Adelaide's seafront so we went for the sunset, walked the pier, snap, snap snap. That eve we wound up at the Beachouse, which offered us attractions in the form of a horse-carousel and a colourful ferris wheel, thanks to the adolescent teenager for the free rides! The single night in the tent was absolutely freeeeeezing, and we woke to an equally frozen and classic camper battery-flat car which we had to call road assistance out to repair, mainly because we couldn't work out how to open the bonnet. This marked the end of another flippant & fantastical venture into some more of Australia's diverse land, oh yeah, then we had to drive ten hours back to melbourne in one day, that was a 'strewth' situation!

I did one more photoshoot before my time was over, this time for Toni&Guy. It was for the new 2010 hairstyle collection which has recently been launched, they closed down one of their salons and got the models in. They were totally recut-styled-and coloured, put through make-up and styling and I then had to photograph head & full body shots for one male and eight female models. That evening they got boozed-up and strutted their new do's down the catwalk in a bar at the afterparty and i was their clicking away at the camera there too. great day.

I had a memorable night for my leaving affair, gathering people met and befriended from across my time in the city for dinner and drinks. Eventually we ended up as planned at the Croft Institute, http://thecroftinstitute.net. A surreal, kooky & deranged concept of a place based around an asylum, psychiatric hospital venue/ come bar which you have to search through the graffitied alleys and between the bins of chinatown to find. Shots are done out of syringes, the toilets are dubbed 'department of hygiene', and such and such. A great unconventional place your sure not to forget anytime soon, which is why i chose it, Melbourne is to be not forgotten in my mind. It will forever stay with me and i'm sure i'll escape the clouds of england once more to re-visit all the wonderful things I came to love in that city; the people, places, culture, and its creativity all under an australian sunkissed glow, you are accepted and loved with open arms and there truly are 'no worries'. I would not hesitate for one second to encourage someone to experience it for themselves, whether it be down under or anywhere else you are destined to travel, go. take your daydream and live it.

melbourne was my muse, now its my memory.