Australian Open, Melbourne AUS: Day 1

I arrived in Melbourne last night about 10:00. My hotel was in sight from the terminal, so I walked it. But Melbourne Park, home of the Australian Open, is on the other side of the City. I rented a car this morning and drove downtown. A little stressful with so much traffic in the vicinity of the Park while driving on the left side of the road. For some reason, I find the traffic circles that flow counter-clockwise the toughest to navigate. Anyway, I found it, but it rained all day. This is the big arena, and has a retractable roof. I looked far and wide for ticket scalpers, didn't see a single one. Weird.

So I wandered the grounds in the rain. This is the largest of the outdoor courts. Margaret Court Arena. Margaret Court was the most amazing women's tennis player in history probably. She's Australian, and won 62 grand slam event titles. 24 singles ones, and slew of doubles ones. Pete Sampras has the most all-time for the men. He had 14 (chased closely by Federer's 11 or 12). Rod Laver was an all-time great too. He won 11 grand slams, including winning the GRAND SLAM twice (1962 and 1969). That means he won all 4 grand slam events in one year. No one else has done it (Fed got 3 last year), and he did it twice! So anyway, they said they might start a match in Margaret Court arena, but the rain only let up for like 15 minutes, and nothing ever started. Better luck tomorrow. Supposed to only be rain in the morning, but I have tickets tomorrow to both indoor arenas.