An Australian Fly By?

We have learned during our travels that we are real "enablers" of each other.  When sending in our ticket applications for Wimbledon just days before the deadline, we all of a sudden realized that the Australian Open was starting in January and wondered if we would have time to swing by quickly to see a few matches en route back to Dubai.  Normal people would have determined this to be a ridiculous idea – 50 hours of flying and a 19 hour time change just to see some tennis was simply ludicrous.  But, once one of us suggested it, the other jumped right on board and before we knew it we were looking into flights and hotels and how to get tickets.

The 25 hour commute from San Diego to Melbourne went by remarkably quickly.  We arrived at the hotel too early for our room to be ready but the Hotel Lindrum staff kindly allowed us to use the staff shower (with its pesky broken door) to freshen up.  Feeling surprisingly energetic, we headed out to get some lunch and wander around the city.  In fact, we were obviously so excited to be in Melbourne that we headed over to the Australian Open to see if we could get some last minute tickets to the matches that evening.

That evening, sitting in Margaret Court Arena, we saw two awesome matches.  The first match was admittedly less competitive with Serena Williams dominating her competitor.  But just seeing her in action was awesome - she is so powerful!  The second match was anything but a cake walk.  Fan favourite, Gael Monfils, was taking on fellow French newcomer, Lucas Pouille (who the crowd joyfully called “Pooey”) and lost the first two sets.  Perhaps because of the supportive crowd and because he “promised his parents he would play well this year”, Monfils fought back and won the last three sets to take the match.  This started what was going to be an incredible few days of tennis…