Another new day, another new photo album on Facebook! Today Jen and I went to the world-famous Melbourne Cup horse races - and I took a whole pile of new pics, most of which can now be found in my "Melbourne Cup" album. I did my best, but let me tell you, it was so crowded and busy at the races that taking good photos was a real challenge!The Melbourne Cup is THE horse race in Australia. It is often touted as "the race that stops a nation" - and that is true! Race day is a public holiday in the city of Melbourne. We understand that pretty much every work place in the country will have a Melbourne Cup party of some sort on this day, and much betting will take place. My friend Ruth up in Sydney even had to move the date of the assembly her class was presenting to their school, because it originally fell on Cup day and the parents complained that it would interfere with their party plans! This country takes its horse racing seriously. This year's races almost didn't go ahead - Australia has been suffering through a severe equine flu outbreak these past few months, and the officials had been warning for weeks that if the epidemic wasn't contained, they would have to cancel the entire spring racing carnival. Thankfully that didn't happen and so Jen and I got to participate in a truly Australian tradition!
Our day started early this morning, as we participated in a champagne breakfast with our house mates and friends. Everyone contributed something to the breakfast - we did crepes with fresh fruit and custard (basically the "April '89" from Cora's restaurants!). It was really neat to see everyone all dressed up with their hats and dresses and feathers. After breakfast we all headed out to the train station and caught the train to the race course. This event is so big that they run special event trains and trams to and from the race track all day long. It was easy to figure out which train platform we needed when we arrived at the North Melbourne station - platform 5 was filled with folks dressed just as fancy as we were!
When we arrived at Flemington, we joined the huge crowds who were all trying to get in through the gates. Trying to find a place to view the races from turned out to be quite the challenge... the place was completely packed. Finally we managed to find an empty bit of grass with a reasonable view of the Jumbotron (since there was no way we were going to get anywhere near the edge of the race track itself). Turns out we'd picked a good spot after all - we had planted ourselves right near the winners circle. This is where the horses are paraded before each race, and then the winning horse, jockey, and owners are presented with their prizes after each race. So I managed to snap a few good pics of this aspect of the day.
Really, the fashion at the Cup was just as important as the races! Everywhere we looked was a sea of colour, with both men and women dressed to the nines. After all the pain we went through to find the proper hats for the day, Jen and I were a little disappointed to find out that not every woman was wearing a hat - I think it was probably about 50/50 between hats and fascinators (the feathery bobbly things that can be seen in some of my pictures). I was quite glad that we'd decided to go the hat route, though - there was no shade at all and it was HOT! The people-watching opportunities were excellent - every time we turned around there was a new dress, a new suit, or a new hat. Not everybody came all dressed up, either - we spotted a group dressed as Santas, a bunch of guys in kilts, three men dressed as musketeers (complete with swords!), neon pink sparkly cowboy hats, wigs of every description, and even men in sailor uniforms. The crowd was huge (something like 102,000 people) and we spent a lot of time just watching people go by.
Of course, the day would not have been complete without a little betting! Jen and I did some exploring around the race track and found the betting pits - so of course we placed bets on two of the horses running in the Cup race. It's not like we had any idea whatsoever on how to place a bet or how to make a "good" bet... so we decided that we'd choose our horses based on our lucky numbers. Jen chose #9 and I chose #3. Unfortunately neither of our horses won the race, so we are no richer than we were before. But we have our tickets to prove that we bet during the Melbourne Cup!
It was a great day, although by late afternoon it was becoming rather obvious that the crowd had been partying hard. The booze had been flowing rather freely all day and folks were becoming rather... um... celebratory. So at about 5pm we decided it was time to head for home.
All I have to say is that I respect all those women who were at the races today in heels - I wore flat sandals and my feet were killing me by the end of the day! I can only imagine how much pain many other women will be in tomorrow morning. Between high-heeled shoes, sunburns, dehydration and hangovers, I wonder what percentage of the Melbourne work force will be calling in sick tomorrow? I, of course, will be sleeping in and enjoying the fact that I don't have to go ANYWHERE. :-)
