While camping on the Great Ocean Road over the holidays, Zack and I took off our wedding rings so as not to lose them in the ocean. The cold water tends to make them pretty loose, and we don't like taking chances that they may fall off. Originally, I had put them in a zipped pocket of my camera bag, but when I found myself bringing my camera bag to the beach nearly every day, I decided that it probably wasn't that smart to leave them in the unattended bag on the beach while we were in the water. So I put them in the upper section of the center console storage compartment of our rental car.
Well, we flipped it open a few times over the next few days to use the lower portion for storing wallets, phones, etc. On Wednesday, when we headed back to Melbourne, we opened the top portion and only saw my engagement ring and birthstone ring sitting there. Both of our wedding bands were missing! Upon shaking the top part a bit, we found Zack's wedding band lodged in the part that flips back, and we were able to pull it out. But mine was still nowhere to be seen!
We searched for awhile around the front seats and center console and then figured it must have dropped behind the seats and that we would find it down there when we unpacked. We got back to Melbourne, took everything out of the car, and it was still missing. I was starting to panic. It's just a plain white gold band, not worth much in monetary value, but the sentimental value is priceless! We had to get the rental car back to the station, so on the drive there, Zack took a screwdriver and tried to take apart the console. That unfortunately didn't give us much access.
We spent some more time at the rental place looking in every nook and cranny of the car, but the ring couldn't be found, so we headed home and hoped it would fall out of something as we unpacked the bags and put things away. No such luck. I was pretty upset that night, but Zack was comforting and urged me to call a mechanic in the morning to see if someone could get into the console. All we could figure was that it had fallen into some crack and was stuck in the plastic piece. I was just glad it wasn't my engagement ring; that would have cost a LOT more to replace!
So the next morning, I called a Hyundai dealership and a few mechanics. Some weren't open because of the holidays, but some said they could try to fit me in. I went back to the rental car place, and they were nice enough to let me "borrow" the car for a few hours to see if I could get my ring back. I drove to the first mechanic; he said he could get to it at some point in the day if I left the car there. I didn't really want to pay for another day's rental, so I drove on to another place, which happened to be closed. Ugh.
But on the same street, there was another auto shop. I randomly pulled in and explained my situation to the guy. He immediately offered to take a look and told me to go sit in the office. Less than ten minutes later, he came in with the console in his hands and said, "You might just be lucky!" as he shook it and we both heard something rattling inside! Sure enough, my ring was in there! He basically had to pry a gap in the seams of the plastic to be able to shake the ring out; he had no idea how it possibly could have even gotten in there. I didn't care; I was just ecstatic to have my ring back! He didn't even charge me anything; he was just glad that the story had a happy ending. So nice!
So the whole incident only cost me a couple of hours on a Thursday morning-big shout outs to two particular employees (sorry, I don't know their names) at
Europcar in St Kilda and
Ultra Tune in Prahran for being so kind and letting/helping me find my ring (without charging me anything!). Please give them your business if you have the opportunity.
And that's the story of my little lost ring. Don't you just love a happy ending? I do! <--Ha-get it?
On Sunday morning, we all went out for brunch and enjoyed some delicious scones with cream and jam. Scones are basically what we would call biscuits. Here a biscuit would be more like a cookie. Anyway, we then we headed to Arthurs Seat, which is a lookout area with some trails and viewpoints and such. The water is a beautiful shade of turquoise down in Mornington Peninsula. It reminded me of the Caribbean (though much colder) or the view from the gondola in Cairns. 
Some of the views from the lookouts on the drive up to Arthurs Seat were actually better than the view at the top (in my opinion). But we didn't do any of the hikes, so that could have made a difference. It's hard to believe that this is only just over an hour away from Melbourne!
Next we headed to Red Hill Winery. This is a pretty famous winery (the restaurant is supposed to be especially good), and the grounds were some of the most beautiful we've seen. With the grapevines in the foreground, and the gorgeous water out in the distance, we relaxed on the lawn in the bean bag chairs for quite awhile. Some of us did the wine tasting, and we had some snacks such as cheese from the local Red Hill Cheese shop. Though it wasn't as warm as Saturday, the sun was still out, so it was a good day.
