Harry Potter and the Cursed Child & Our Gluten Free Introduction to Melbourne

December 10, 2019

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child & Our Gluten Free Introduction to Melbourne

Princess Theatre, Melbourne, Victoria

A trip that was a long time in the planning stage. Five women all with similar but also vastly different opinions. It started with a love for Harry Potter books, movies and well just everything that involves Harry Potter!

There we were, one mother, 5 daughters, 2 sisters, 2 aunts and 5 nieces and grand daughters.

We started talking about seeing the play in October 2018 and the 13 months from start to finish went sooo slowly.

Of course the first thing we did was to book the tickets for the play. The accommodation and flights would come after this!!!

So the day of departure arrived and we eagerly headed off to the Perth, Domestic Airport for our red-eye flight to Melbourne. The flight managed to arrive about 50 minutes earlier than expected which with the car hire place not opening till 7 am, meant we were just hanging around till the free bus arrived.

We collected our car (read here 8 seater mini van) and headed off. Originally we had grand plans of heading off to do the Great Ocean Road, but lack of sleep changed our plans. We had breakfast at the first of our Gluten Free restaurants - 'Cafe Henkel'. Coffee and eggs refreshed us before we took off sightseeing, though we ended up staying local to our accommodation, which we took possession of at 1.00 pm.

Cafe Henkel are at 102 Henkel street, Brunswick. 100% gluten free and Coeliac accredited. They were in a back street in the industrial area, but well worth the visit. During our stay we visited them twice, and sampled the breakfast and lunch food. Very nice food with friendly and helpful staff.

Ciao Mamma - we had an excellent feed and the staff were very friendly and knowledgeable about Coeliac disease requirements. At the end of the meal we asked what bread they used for the garlic bread in the picture, the owner rang his wife "the boss" at home to ask her.

Ciao Mamma, Italian Restaurant

Stalactites

Stalactites - Very good Greek food. The meat was so tender, and the staff were extremely friendly. We rang them 5 minutes before we got there to see if they could squeeze us in at lunch time.

Hemp Kitchen

Bodega Underground also warrant a special mention. We booked to eat there prior to going to part 1 of THE play. We got lost and ended up being an hour late to our booking. The staff rang us twice to make sure we were still intending eating there, and when we arrived seated us with huge smiles and very fast service. The food was amazing!!!! The best Mexican food I have had ever!!!!

Bodega Underground - L to R, Amanda, Sarah and Lisa

Bodega Underground - L to R Megan and Me

Our reason for visiting Melbourne was towards the end of our stay. We had elected to see the play over two nights rather than all in one sitting. We all thoroughly enjoyed it, and spent an inordinate amount of time in the souvenir shop on both nights. Well worth the money and I would recommend the play to anyone who is in love with the Harry Potter franchise - be it movies, books or all.

We managed to fit in quite a bit of eating and visited the following establishments on our 7 day adventure, with only one cooked dinner at the townhouse:-
- Ciao Mamma - Italian restaurant
- Gluten Free 4 U Bakery, Boronia
- Simply Gluten Free, Mentone
- Cheltenham Moorabbin RSL - 50 Acres bar and bistro
- Sweet Salt - Fish and Chips
- Cafe Henkel
- Hella Good
- Stalactites
- Hemp Kitchen
- Seedling cafe - Flinders lane
- Bodega Underground

We did a fair bit of travelling and also managed a 3 1/2 hour walking tour of Melbourne city as well as doing a decent amount of shopping. Some of the places we visited were -
- Federation square
- Melbourne General Cemetery (visited our great great grand parents graves and also saw the memorial for Burke and Wills)
- Queen Victoria Markets
- Old Melbourne Jail
- Chinatown
- Hanging Rock
- Daylesford markets
- Costco
- 2 x DFO stores
- 2 x Christmas stores
- Brighton beach

We had a great time and the accommodation was excellent. We had booked a 4 story townhouse which while it meant a lot of climbing of stairs, also allowed the 5 of us to have a room each.

It amazed me the amount of gluten free and Coeliac accredited restaurants and cafes. In my research before our trip I had clocked up 49 all within 30 minutes drive of our townhouse.