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#10 Wimbledon!

9 Jul

The world famous tennis tournament right on our doorstep! This is our second year living in Wimbledon and we missed out on tickets last year. The ballot process is complex and there is no favouritism for residents of SW19. Boo.

BUT, this year we managed to get two Centre Court tickets! Six rows from the front and next to the Royal Box! I called Nick with the amazing news, only to be told that he was in Paris that weekend because his friend got four tickets for the Euros. So my friend Sarah inherited the second ticket and we were excited!

Wimbledon is much more sophisticated than I thought it would be. I’ve been to the US Open and it was a great day out, but this was something different. Staff in pristine uniform, immaculate grounds, and it just had a feel of grandness and history.

And the proof we were there? Check out the lady in the black hat… yours truly! Sarah is sitting in white to the left. Yep, that is Roger Federer! 🙂

We also got to see Novak Djokovic, see if you can spot him in photos below!

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#28 Photo with a Celebrity

23 Jun

Last year England hosted the Rugby World Cup, and I found myself wanting to get tickets,  because why not! But tickets were allocated by ballot and tickets on StubHub were extortionate. I couldn’t justify spending a week’s wages because I’m not enough of a fan.

So, when I saw a Facebook post from MasterCard with a chance to win tickets to Australia vs England I rushed home to enter straight away. I work in social media and run competitions regularly so I know what the judges are looking for in an entry. Long story short, I won and of course Nick was the recipient of the other ticket.

What is funny about this situation is that we thought it was two tickets to the match and it advertised that accommodation was included for three nights. We thought maybe the Holiday Inn Express in Twickenham? Maybe a small B&B walking distance to the ground. It would be cool to check out Twickenham’s local town and pubs or the weekend! When we were told it would be a five star hotel in central London, this prize suddenly got interesting. Ok, what cool things could we do in central London? Let’s be tourists in our own city for a weekend! A bus tour, sightseeing and nice restaurants! YAY! I was informed that I would shortly receive an email with more details. Refresh. Refresh. Refresh. Ping. “RSVP: Your Invitation to Join MasterCard at 2015 Rugby World Cup‏”

The prize absolutely blew us away. I remember logging into the microsite that they sent me a link to and needing to sit down. Royal Horseguards in Embankment for three nights! WOW! What country do you support? What is your shirt size or your country’s jersey which we’ll leave in your room?  What train station can the limousine pick you up from? Here is your itinerary for the next three days. Itinerary?! 

Day 1: Check in. Champagne on arrival. Dinner at the Royal Horseguards.

Day 2: Breakfast at hotel, bus tour of London, lunch at a 5 star restaurant, dinner at a 5 star restaurant.

Day 3 : Breakfast at hotel, London Eye – TWICE around with champagne and canapes, lunch at a 5 star hotel, private coach to Twickenham stadium, access to Mastercard hospitality suite, dinner served, free flowing champagne.

The below photo is us in the Mastercard hospitality suite, where we got to meet Martin Johnson and get a photo with the Rugby World Cup.

(For those of you who don’t know who the giant below is, he was the England captain when they won the RWC in 2003. His comment to me when we asked for a photo – “Only if you take off that Australia jersey” *feels two feet tall*)

#28 well and truly checked off in style!

MJ

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#11 Flamenco Show in Spain

8 Aug

I can’t believe that I’m 30! How did this happen? I feel like I went to bed one night as a 26-year-old and woke up as a 30-year-old!

Celebrating my 30th away from my family and friends back home in Australia was difficult, but luckily I have an amazing boyfriend who whisked me off to Barcelona for a long weekend to drink as much sangria and eat as much tapas as my heart desired.

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While in Barcelona, one thing that was on our ‘must do’ list was going to a Flamenco show – And what an experience it was! The men and women were so passionate about the whole performance and really gave it everything that they had. I was desperate to take photos and videos of the whole show, but sadly we weren’t allowed until the end, to avoid distraction for the performers and audience. Luckily we had five minutes at the end where all the performers came on stage for a group ending. My photos aren’t great, which is really frustrating, but you’ll get the idea. They just moved too quickly for my poor little Canon point-and-shoot camera!

A huge shout-out to Nick for organising this night for us while we were there – it was a complete surprise that we were doing this, on this night! One of many surprises he had for me that weekend 🙂

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#15 Helicopter ride over Sydney

13 Nov

This was a fun one! I bought this helicopter ride for Nick for his 30th birthday and the timing worked well as we booked it for our last day in Sydney before the FINAL move. A lovely way to say goodbye to my beautiful home city! And the weather was perfect… it usually is in Sydney anyway.

We hired a Go Get car (as I sold my Peugeot in May) and at 8am we were off to Sydney airport. When we got there, there was no one else in the office – YES! We weren’t sharing the helicopter with any other groups!

After watching a safety video and signing our life away we were taken out to a tiny helicopter. It was honestly about the size of a car! Nick sat in the front (as it was his gift!) and I sat in the back, which had just as good of a view.

Taking off felt strangely smooth. I’m so used to taking off in huge A380 or 737 and feeling the vibration along the runway. In a helicopter you simply lift off the floor. I know that seems obvious but it hadn’t occurred to me until then that it would be so flawless. The same goes for the flight. We both felt like we were just driving in a car in the sky. Very surreal.

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A quick two minutes in the sky and we were already approaching the city and looking down on the skyscrapers as if they were matchsticks and the people as if they were ants. We passed our apartment and I felt a little emotional knowing that it was going to be the last time we saw it from the outside.

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Over the tall city buildings and then through Sydney Harbour. The Sydney Harbour Bridge on our left and Opera House on our right… Sydney sparkled like a diamond. Almost as if it knew we were leaving that day.

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Then next we passed over the suburb where I grew up – Mosman. We flew all around the bays and beaches and it was lovely to see my part of the world from above. Next we went out to Manly Beach and came back into Sydney Harbour then made our way over to Bondi Beach.

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With over 100 beaches in Sydney, there are too many that we passed over to name, but they all looked beautiful. Before we knew it we were passing over Maroubra Beach and heading back south to the airport. The 20 minutes had gone by so quickly and we didn’t want it to end, but definitely glad we did this activity in Sydney of all cities. It truly is the most naturally beautiful city in the world!

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#10 Attend the US Open

21 Jan

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We actually did #10 back in August 2012, but since its on the list it deserves a quick post.

We bought grounds passes for the day so we could attend more matches but managed to sneak into the Arthur Ashe Stadium to watch Andy Murray. Murray then went on to win The US Open 2012 so it was great that we got to see him play. The photo below was taken just after we got in and found some empty seats. You can’t really see it in this photo without zooming in but Nick is pointing to the big writing saying “NO ENTRY TO ARTHUR ASHE”. Cheeky!

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#31 Watch a movie at the OpenAir Cinema

18 Jan

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I know that #31 isn’t supposed to exist on a 30 under 30 list, but rules are made to be broken and this experience was absolutely worth a mention. I can’t think of anywhere else in the world where you can watch a movie outside, on a 30 degree night, with such an iconic background. Sometimes I found myself watching the view instead of the screen!

Two good friends of ours managed to get four tickets to this sell-out event. Each year the St George OpenAir Cinema runs for the month of January and it sells out online within minutes. So we were pretty happy that they chose to invite us!

I can see why the event is a sell-out every year. You are able arrive early for a glass of champagne (or a bottle) at the outdoor bar and watch the sunset over the harbour. When it gets dark enough a screen comes up from the ground letting you know that its time to go to your seat… and you are allowed to take your glass (bottle) of champagne with you!

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Oh, and the movie playing that night was The Impossible. A very emotional true story and a miracle! Worth watching if you remember the Boxing Day tsunami in 2004.

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#24 Attend a Coldplay Concert!

20 Nov

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Finally! Thanks to Coldplay we get to make our first post and what a great first post to make! We were lucky enough to go see these guys on Sunday 18 November 2012 at Allianz Stadium in Sydney. Easily one of the best concerts we’ve both been to.

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Originally there was only meant to be one Sydney concert to promote their new album, Mylo Xyloto, but it sold out so quickly that they announced another and after attending one, you can see why! From start to finish it was a complete audio and visual experience and every Coldplay classic performed. Yellow. Paradise. Fix You. Clocks. Speed of Sound. If it was a hit, they played it! Confetti shot up into the air raining over everyone (Nick almost inhaled some! It was hilarious!), beach balls bounced around the crowd and lasers lit up the stadium. However, by far the most amazing sight was watching over 50,000 lights around people’s wrists (given upon entrance) pulse to the music.

To top it all off, on the way out of the stadium, they were handing out Coldplay fridge magnets. #24 and #8 both accomplished in one night!

Fridge magnet #3 out of 30! (With a heart shaped piece of confetti from the concert!)

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