No. 12: Watch a Grand Slam. Live.

That was amazeballs!

Genuine awe and wonder. Melbourne Park is huge, having two arenas in one place is pretty epic, almost a little decadent. Certainly very impressive.

The atmosphere there is brilliant. Very jovial. Loads of people dressed up in various fancy dress. There were three girls dressed in kangaroo costumes who had brass instruments. They walked around the park all day playing things like 'Waltzing Matilda' and 'Tie Me Kangaroo Down'.

You get offered plenty of swag while your wandering. In the end I came away with 4 scroll banners with various encouraging slogans, 2 brilliant Jacobs Creek/Aus Open wine glasses, 2 sweatbands, a pair of comical sunglasses, a folding seat cushion, chocolate, Dove cosmetics, and a fan.

I got my official players towel. So pretty.

They do well to keep the masses entertained. When you're not watching matches you can get your face painted, have your caricature done, test the speed of your serve, go water zorbing, have a massage, relax in an anti-sauna, or play video games. All for the very reasonable price of zero dollars. Though you do have to queue a bit.

You don't realise the etiquette involved before actually going to see a live match. I did get told off for walking around the Margaret Court Arena while they were playing.  I wondered why people were standing in the entrances when there were loads of seats...

Definite highlight was seeing Serena and Venus play the Doubles number 1 seed, Errani & Vinci, who wemt on to win the championship. The sisters really were something special. It was a really good match. They are very intimidating to watch, sort of conspiratorial in a way. Most doubles kind of do a high-five or pat on the shoulder each point, but they have a little discussion almost like they are plotting the demise of their opponent. They did lose though. Haha.

The Legends Doubles matches were fantastic. They were really hilarious. So much fun to watch. They have a laugh on court which is quite refreshing. Martina Hingis, Navratilova, Ivanisavic, Mauresmo and Davenport all played at some point and were really brilliant.
Bradke and Stubbs were definitely the most entertaining, I saw them play a couple of times. One was playing awfully so the other made her sit down and got one of the ball boys to play instead. Well I thought it was funny. Haha.

The practise courts were packed. I did manage to see Serena, Djokovic, Ferrer & Federer there though. No Murray. Apparently he's now so good he doesn't need to show up for practise.

The final is tonight & I'm back in Perth. Can't believe it's over. I'll definitely be going back next year.