(Posted 8-Nov-2007; backdated to the day it happened)

I’d booked a car for the day, so we could head out of the city, see the countryside, and so we could visit the St Kilda tram museum and adventure playground, the former only being open on Sundays, and both of them being impossible to get to by public transport. (They’re about 2km from the nearest bus route… which doesn’t run on Sundays anyway.)

But first there was breakfast. We went down to the ground floor cafe/restaurant/thingy, the jawdroppingly inspiringly named “Cafe 31″ (’cos the hotel is at number 31 in North Terrace). The kids decided to run the two storeys down the fire escape, racing against the lift — something they continued to do for the rest of our stay. On the way down, they’d usually beat it (it was a pretty slow lift). On the way up, the lift would usually beat them.

Looking through last year’s trip entries, I note the full buffet breakfast at the Travelodge in Sydney was $16.50 for adults and $7.50 for kids, which I thought at the time was a bit pricey, but ultimately worth it. Here? $18.90 per person, with no discounts for kids. $56.70 for breakfast?!? Yeeeeouch! I know, I know, you’re paying for the convenience of it all. We paid up this once, but I vowed to restrict us to the Continental breakfast the next day. Not that it wasn’t tasty, but jeez. I made sure to grab a complimentary newspaper to try and get my money’s worth.

After fuelling up we headed out. First we walked up to Rundle Mall, looking for the market. Eventually we found it at the point where Rundle Mall becomes Rundle Street (but before it becomes Rundle Road… who was Rundle, anyway?). The market didn’t look like very much we couldn’t find at the markets in Melbourne. Besides, handcrafted stuff bore my kids stiff, no matter how nice it is. And frankly I’m not that enthralled myself. So we backtracked to the Avis car rental place I’d booked with, back on North Terrace.

The Avis lady behind the counter seemed a little stern and business-like, but I expect I would be too if I had to work from 8am on a Sunday morning. She said we’d got an upgrade (I booked a Corolla, we got a Yaris; what a silly name) and gave me the key and the directions to the carpark, which was a couple of doors up.
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