The six bed dorm
I arrived in Melbourne the following day about lunch time.True to form I hadn’t thought much where I might stay. Melbourne is a city that I have passed through on a couple of occasions but never had the need or inclination to stay any length of time.This time though I wanted to ‘ave a look, I headed straight for the city, rode around the main streets, taking note when I saw a backpacker joint, until I found some where to park the bike. In Melbourne this is not a problem, I saw bikes parked all over the city on the footpaths….why can’t it be this easy everywhere?…So, headed back to where I’d seen a few places, parked up and tried the first one..full..tried another…full…oh shit, Grand Final weekend, of course!……full….full…..full…..! eventually I arrived at http://www.kingstreetbackpackers.com.au/ . Not only did they have a bed for me, they also had somewhere for the bike, a very important part of being in a city. This was where we were meant to be and all the other places weren’t worthy of us anyway, I had to get up early in the morning and move the bike onto the footpath, so the owner could get her car in the garage but that was easy, my baby was bedded down for the night, nice and cosy and I had a bed to sleep in.
This was my first backpacker experience and I had to get used to staying in a room with half a dozen 18 to 25 year olds, not hard for this old hippie, I’d just spent 4 months up in the snow with some fantastic young folk. I was beginning to to feel right at home in their company but my liver was suffering.
I shared a room with Reece at Falls which was ok but I was about to be introduced to the six bunk bed dorm, full of young men with no regard for tidiness or cleanliness. Travelling around as I am, I have to stay in cheap accommodation, in the city that means backpackers and dorms…toughen up kid and get used to it….! It had a laundry and a kitchen, a common room with TV and a dining area …home sweet home!
Mostly, people are there for a short time to look at the sites around Melbourne before moving on to the next place, then there are the crowd that have been there for some time, either working to get funds for future trips, looking for flats to stay in Melbourne, or bums with nowhere else to go. The clique, the cool crowd, they who believe this is their place!
I am….THE LONESOME TRAVELLER….travelling east….BE HAPPY!