Escape to Melbourne

[RB]

Must say I had never heard of escape rooms when I first read your report. I see we have one locally and it seems to get reasonable reviews Escape Rooms Port Macquarie | Facade Escape Rooms

 

[kookaburra75]

Must say I had never heard of escape rooms when I first read your report. I see we have one locally and it seems to get reasonable reviews Escape Rooms Port Macquarie | Facade Escape Rooms

They are good fun - we have a couple in a Canberra. Last time we for the work Christmas do and I was locked in a small room and the rest of the team had to get me out, let's just say they took their sweet time about it!
@exceladdict , next time you're in Melbourne there are some great food places near where you stayed you might might to give a go, that I think would match your tastes/likes.
HuTong - Market Lane (best dumpling place in Melbourne
Cafe Segovia - Block Place (great coffee and food tucked away on a classic laneway)
1806 - you found
City Wine Shop - 159 Spring Street (great wine selection and food, sit up at the bar for the full experience)

 

[exceladdict]

Must say I had never heard of escape rooms when I first read your report. I see we have one locally and it seems to get reasonable reviews Escape Rooms Port Macquarie | Facade Escape Rooms

Have not yet been to Port Macquarie but if/when I'll have to give it a shot!

They are good fun - we have a couple in a Canberra. Last time we for the work Christmas do and I was locked in a small room and the rest of the team had to get me out, let's just say they took their sweet time about it!
@exceladdict , next time you're in Melbourne there are some great food places near where you stayed you might might to give a go, that I think would match your tastes/likes.
HuTong - Market Lane (best dumpling place in Melbourne
Cafe Segovia - Block Place (great coffee and food tucked away on a classic laneway)
1806 - you found
City Wine Shop - 159 Spring Street (great wine selection and food, sit up at the bar for the full experience)

Always on the hunt for good dumplings! Hope to get back over this year for some more rooms and will check those out

 

[exceladdict]

Harry Potter and The Cursed Child

After a few hours of wandering and shopping, we zipped over towards the Princess Theatre for one of the other main reasons we came to Melbourne: to see the Harry Potter and The Cursed Child play. As someone who hasn’t seen a lot of non-musical live theatre, this was an awesome experience.

We had signed up for the Sunday double-header, where the matinee performance was of part one, and the evening of part two, so after a somewhat active four days we were looking forward to being restfully entertained.

Beforehand though it was necessary to have a ‘light lunch’. Around the corner, we found some churros at Butcher’s Diner, which was just what we needed.



I won’t describe the play in detail, other than to say I was amazed by the stage/set, the way that lighting and special effects were used, and I really enjoyed being thrust back into the HP universe (as did Mrs Excel). I think that it wouldn’t be quite as special/enjoyable to someone who wasn’t a Harry Potter fan, so if you’re on the edge about going, that might be a useful deciding factor for you before making the investment in the reasonably expensive tickets. Happy to answer any follow-up Qs.

In between the two seatings, Mrs Excel had booked us for a dinner around the corner at Rice Paper Scissors. It was probably my favourite food from our whole time in Melbourne. And we weren't the only ones to think so - make sure you book in advance:



We started with Lychee and ‘You Can’t Touch This’ mocktails:



Followed by a selection of share plates including Thai Chicken, Bao, Lamb Ribs, ‘Crying Tiger’ Beef, and BBQ Prawns.





I’d strongly recommend this place, especially for a mid-show booking of the sort we enjoyed.




With a little more time to kill we then went for a stroll and wound up at Boilermaker House for some cheeses. I was blown away by the chef’s cheese knowledgeability and the blue cheese was the nicest that either of us had ever enjoyed. Wish I wrote down what it was!



We then returned for part two of the play, before heading back to the Novotel for the last night there.

 

[exceladdict]

Monday and Home Time

We enjoyed one last breakfast at the Novotel before packing up and checking out. Mrs Excel and I both had some people to meet in suburban Melbourne so we walked about 15 minutes over to Avis to pick up a vehicle. Never fun walking on sidewalks with a suitcase, but it was far from the depths of trudging through snow with cases, as we’ve done previously.

Amidst our errands we stopped at Crate Speciality Coffee for lunch and enjoyed a Bacon Toastie and Veggie Wrap (and great coffees):



One more stop to look at art supplies before we drove to leave the car at Melbourne airport.

 

[exceladdict]

MEL QF DOM J LOUNGE

After walking over from the avis rental return, we made our way quickly through security and up to the domestic J lounge, our first visit since its renovation. I quite liked that the views have improved and that you have a direct entrance to the J area, compared to the previous iteration of the lounge.



The menu for our first visit to the spice bar was cool, though Mrs Excel preferred the Mexican bar at BNE:



Overall it was some of the best lounge food I’ve had in Australia, though the pork was a bit fatty, the flavour was great and the vegetables delicious (there was a vegetarian option as well as the pork).





I did manage to get a shower in, one of my favourite airport activities especially before the leg back to Perth. While the aspar products once again smelled beautiful, the towels were soft and there was no wait to go in (making me very happy), I do have a feeling that the showers hadn’t been cleaned in a while, as the floor felt a bit grimey.

I went in the first shower suite available and another thing that concerned me is the locking system on the shower door. There wasn’t anything on the inside to show that the door was locked, other than the click, and it’s not very obvious from the outside which suites are occupied. Therefore, a number of people tried to open the door of the suite I was using. This is not comforting when you’re using the various facilities of the suite!

One other issue is that unlike the previous iteration of shower suites, there were no speakers announcing boarding calls, which I think is an important feature of airport bathrooms.

On the whole I do think we are spoiled when it comes to domestic lounges flying QF J, and it’s always a nice stop before flying home.

 

[exceladdict]

Flight 3: MEL-PER, QF650, 737 J, 3D&F, VH-VXL

Lastly, we flew home on the standard 737, opting for the second last MEL-PER of the day to get home at a slightly more palatable hour for going to work the next day. The flight was largely uneventful; I managed to catch up on some work tasks. The seats are of course more comfortable than economy:


And as a bonus, our power sockets worked this time:


The Menu:


The pumpkin soup was very nice:


I went for the tacos, which were OK:


I think Mrs excel had the fish:


And we shared a cheese plate to finish up.


All in all a comfortable flight – for a quick trip, we think it’s a good use of QF points for the added comfort over Y.

Thanks for following along for the ride! As mentioned above, we hope to be over to Melbourne for some more escape rooms later this year or next, so will add to this TR as and when that happens.

 

[VPS]

Interesting TR - I've never tried an escape room but love puzzles so maybe I should give it a go

 

[exceladdict]

Interesting TR - I've never tried an escape room but love puzzles so maybe I should give it a go

It can be very interesting going in with friends or your significant other to see how good you really are at communicating

 

[OZDUCK]

Thanks for writing up a very different report.