Red Wine Hangover

That's right. Red wine hangover. Each hangover has it's own special signature. For me, the lager hangover is a predominantly nauseous one, offering a churning stomach and the distinct impression that a large marsupial has shat in ones mouth. The whisky hangover is a doozie, especially if - like me - you're partial to the peaty smokiness of Laphroaig. The self same taste of burnt peat, so invigorating whilst you're sipping a dram or seven beside a crackling open fire, returns the following morning, bringing with it a cotton-wool head and dicky tummy, leaving you feeling that your tongue was used to clean out the grate of said fire while you were asleep.

But the red wine hangover is a specialist. The red wine hangover concentrates almost entirely on the head, giving a headache of such proportions that the sufferer may be forgiven for believing they're experiencing a full blown embolism. And this is what the dear Mrs V and I woke with this morning; a pulsating, behind the temples affair that took a couple of co-codamol (the pain killer of kings) a few litres of Melbourne's finest tap water and a walk through the chill drizzle that had blessed us once again, before it would even consider receding.

'Why were you suffering so?' I hear your cry. Well, that rather nice looking Italian I told you about yesterday turned out to be an absolute gem of a place. Il Solito Posto is a restaurant of two halves, so to speak, one - a classy trattoria; the other - a basement bistro. Being the plebs we are we opted, of course, for the bistro (to be fair, we tried to book at the trattoria but couldn't get in).

It's a delight of a place, down some stone steps to the basement which is all dark wood bar, cramped tables and blackboard menus on the walls. It's one of those cracking spots where all you can see of the outside world is peoples' feet going to-and-fro on the pavement above. All terribly evocative, just a shame you can't smoke inside in Victoria, that would have completed the atmosphere to perfection. I briefly thought they could do with some pictures of Mussolini on the walls, but that would probably be overkill.

As I say, the menu was purely blackboard and nothing more really other than soups, pasta and salad. Perfect. A delightful waitress talked us through the options; it was all in Italian, which seems a tad over-the-top when you're 10000 miles away from Italy and the staff have to take the time out to translate for the clientele, but it all added to the 'atmos'. We both opted for a simple pasta dish (her tomato, me seafood) before being hit by the wine list. I say list - it basically looked like half a ream of copier paper clipped to a clipboard. But boy, did this place know its wines! Quickly and correctly identifying the look of confusion on our faces, the waitress asked us about the kind of wines we liked, contrasted them with what we were eating, then brought three bottles over to let us have a taster. Bloody marvellous! You don't get this down TGI Friday's, I can tell you.

We settled on a wine (after much complimentary tasting, of course) and devoured our fresh, simple and exceedingly tasty bowls of pasta with gusto, along with another great rocket, pear and parmesan salad. Then we asked our waitress what she had by way of a decent local Shiraz. Out came three more bottles to help us settle on one that suited our base English palates and we finally decided on a corker, the name of which entirely - and perhaps understandably - escapes me. It was so nice, we had another bottle. Then - I think - we moved onto ordering by the glass. I mean, you don't want to over-do it, do you...?

We finally paid up, tipped in the manner of pissed tourists (heavily) and swerved and wobbled our way the two blocks to our hotel. Emboldened by our love of all things alcoholic, we headed to the Martini bar within the Westin and compounded our boozy/foodie evening with a couple of extravagantly named (and priced) cocktails, which was a fine idea on top of a gut load of wine, or at least it was if you like feeling ill.

Anyhoo, heads were understandably thick this morning, but a dawdle in the drizzle seemed to have cleared things up sufficiently, so we extended our dawdle a mile northwards of our hotel to the Queen Victoria Market. I love markets, and this one is outstanding - and huge. It's housed in a number of vast shed-like structure, each one selling a different range of food or goods. There's one for meat, one for fish, one for deli produce, and a huge area is given over to fruit and veg, the size, freshness and variety of which you will never - and I mean never - see the like of in Britain. Bell peppers the size of a baby's head (they call then capsicums or 'caps' in a typically Oz shortening), massive red onions, and salads that - when put on display across the market stalls - look as extensive, green and lush as a rainforest canopy.

Then there's the sheds full of tat (there's no other way of describing it I'm afraid). But it's thoroughly entertaining tat, from 'Simpsons' towels to bush ranger's hats, scented candles to DVDs, and smoking paraphernalia to the perennial cuddly koalas. Great fun, and as the weather was - well - pissing it down outside it was the perfect place to spend the rest of the morning (and some of the afternoon).

Stepping back onto the street during a lull in the rain, we only managed to get a couple of blocks before the weather worsened and finally led us to take a trip on Melbourne's famous City Circle Tram. One was passing, so it seemed a shame not to.


Not only is this route plied by some wonderful old vintage trams, it's also free and seemed like the ideal place, at the very least, to shelter from the rain for a while. As it's name suggests, it follows a circular track all the way around the city and even has a (albeit recorded) commentary pointing out interesting sights and buildings along the way. Tizer thought it was great and that, combined with the rather incessant rain outside, made us go round twice. We're crazy like that.

Lunch, in stark comparison to the fantastic meal last night, was at an 'Irish' pub call Bridie O'Reilly's, the food in which was - in no uncertain terms - an affront to humanity. They should have some kind of roving UN Ambassador to deliver us from this kind of thing. Everything that came out of the kitchen looked like a fried lump of fat and, in Mrs V's case, that's exactly what it was. She sent her first 'steak' back, but when it's replacement arrived it looked even worse, so we quit. It wasn't even worth complaining; we tipped like sober and rather miffed tourists (not at all) and ventured back out into the rain.

The crap food had taken the edge off the day a little, and the red wine hangover - supplemented by a pint of piss-poor Guinness - was starting to creep back, so we returned to the hotel for a Westin Sit Down in the Westin Bar and enjoyed a Westin lager or two. The hangover has been banished once again and we're now looking forward to a 'night in', with a few more drinks and a bite to eat in the (really very good) hotel restaurant.

We're moving on again tomorrow - the last leg of our trip already! - flying to Sydney, then driving north for an hour or so to Avalon where we're renting a house in which to spend Christmas. Yes Christmas, bet you'd forgotten about all that malarky, hadn't you? We certainly had...