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Australian Football Fanatics

October 6, 2014 by David Herd

AFL or Australian Football Fanatics

Australian Football Fanatics

Australian football fanatics is an understatement, ten days ago on Saturday September 27 2014 100,000 people were at the MCG for the grand final. Sadly for me Hawthorn smashed my beloved Sydney Swans. The Swans did win the flag in 2012 & 2005, this post focuses on my trip to Melbourne in 2006 for what we Aussies call an Australian football fanatics weekend escape.

Another incredibly busy year in 2006 for travel including Belem at the mouth of the mighty Amazon , Fortaleza on the north coast of Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, Buzios, Cabo Frio & another great trip to Tuscany & Portofino.

Melbourne Cricket Ground

Melbourne Cricket Ground or the MCG is the home of Australian football. Until the 1970s, more than 120,000 people sometimes crammed into the venue – the record crowd standing at around 130,000 for a Billy Graham evangelistic crusade in 1959, followed by 121,696 for the 1970 VFL Grand Final. Grandstand redevelopments and occupational health and safety legislation have now limited the maximum seating capacity to approximately 95,000 with an additional 5000 standing room capacity, bringing the total capacity to 100,024.

Australian football fantatics David Herd & Ross Kennedy

With my good friend Ross Kennedy at the “G” to watch a game of Australian football.

Going to Telstra Dome for Australian football

Ross Kennedy with Mariana’s nieces & brother Steven Vasiljevic.

Up There, Cazaly

Melbourne parliament house

Parliament House in Melbourne, located at Spring Street in East Melbourne at the edge of the Melbourne city centre, has been the seat of the Parliament of Victoria, Australia, since 1855.

East Melbourne near the MCG.

A beautiful park beside he city.

Flinders St Station

Flinders Street is served by Metro’s suburban services, and V/Line regional services to Gippsland. It is the busiest station on Melbourne’s metropolitan network, with some 92.6 million passenger movements recorded in 2011/12.

It was the first railway station in an Australian city and the world’s busiest passenger station in the late 1920s.

The main station building, completed in 1909, is a cultural icon of Melbourne, with its prominent dome, arched entrance, tower and clocks one of the city’s most recognisable landmarks. It is listed on the Victorian Heritage Register. The Melburnian idiom “I’ll meet you under the clocks” refers to the row of clocks above the main entrance, which indicate the time-tabled time of departure for trains on each line; another idiom, “I’ll meet you on the steps”, refers to the wide staircase underneath these clocks. Flinders Street Station is responsible for two of Melbourne’s busiest pedestrian crossings, both across Flinders Street, including one of Melbourne’s few pedestrian scrambles.

St Paul’s Cathedral, Melbourne

St Paul’s Cathedral is built on the site where the first public Christian services in Melbourne were led by Dr Alexander Thomson in 1836. Soon afterwards a small wooden chapel was built elsewhere, and the area became a corn market until 1848, when it was made available for the building of the bluestone St Paul’s Parish Church. Consecrated in 1852, this Church was used until 1885, when it was demolished to make way for the present Cathedral.

Religion in Australia is diverse but the country is predominantly Christian with, in an optional question on the 2011 Census, 61.1% of the Australian population declaring some variety of Christianity. Historically the percentage has been far higher and the religious landscape of Australia is changing and diversifying. Also in 2011, 22.3% of Australians stated “no religion”, and a further 8.55% chose not to answer the question. The remaining population is a diverse group which includes Buddhists (2.5%), Muslims (2.2%), Hindus (1.3%), Jews (0.45%) and Sikhs (0.3%).

Melbourne skyline

Blue sky in Melbourne is a bonus. 🙂

If it was Bangkok it would be a coup.

Not Bangkok just Swanston St Melbourne, the weekend warriors having a parade.

Federation Square

Federation Square in Melbourne, is a mixed-use development covering an area of 3.2 hectares and centred around two major public spaces: open squares and one covered, built on top of a concrete deck above busy railway lines.

Federation Square

Located on the corner Swanston St & Flinders St, Melbourne.

The Yarra River

The lower stretches of the river is where the city of Melbourne was established in 1835 and today Greater Melbourne dominates and influences the landscape of its lower reaches. I hope you have noticed that Australian football is not the only attraction in Melbourne. 🙂