Old and Newport

Today I took the boys down to the Newport Folk Festival on the train. I love Newport for three reasons: the Vinnies, the bakery and the library. But today I found a couple more excuses to visit this cute suburb.

Folk Festival in the park

Each time I visit Newport I visit Sammy's bakehouse. This middle eastern bakery makes the best range of sweet bagels that I have ever tasted. My favourite is the custard bagel which at only $3.50 is totally worth the embarrassment of it leaving a mess around your mouth.

Amazing custard bagel

I have mentioned the Newport Vinnies several times in this blog because it is seriously one of the best op shops in the area. The store is colour coordinated and has a very high turnaround.  If you like retro goods or just a treasure hunt, you could spend hours in this place (and I did today).

Check out this dyed pig skin 1970s jacket that I found on the half price rack. Amazing.

There are a number of little shops around Newport that I have never been in to. So I thought I would do a bit of a lucky dip today and step into the Newport General Store. I was hoping for a mixed lolly cabinet, but instead I found some yummy Turkish bread which I will use for Tonight's Tea. The owner served me and mentioned that in a couple of weeks the General Store will be turned into a cafe. It sounded pretty sweet so I think I will pop down in a couple of weeks and check it out.

Newport General Store

Small selection of good fruit and veg at the General Store

Next door to the General Store is the Malt and Vine bottle shop. Shiver me timbers, this joint is excellent if you are a beer lover. I picked up a king brown bottle by Bullant Brewery to go with Tonight's Tea. Yessssss....

Malt and Vine... it was a hard choice.

King brown for tonight

After cruising the streets of Newport to the sounds of the Folk Festival, I headed back to the station only to find there were no trains but replacement buses instead. The line for the bus was super long and the people at the front of the queue had been waiting for 20mins. It didn't look promising for me and the almighty pram. So we started hot footing it back to Yarraville via Melbourne Road (not the best thing to do in Cuban heels) and what a stroke of luck we had!

Tucked away in the back streets of Newport, just off Old Melbourne Road is One in a Mill. A very cool vintage store located in the old Newport Mill. This store has loads of extremely well priced goodies from the 1960s and 1970s as well as plenty of industrial style items such as lockers, farmery and signage. Definitely worth checking out.

the hard-to-find One in a Mill

When passing Spotswood, I stopped into the Orthodox Op Shop on Melbourne Road. My pram couldn't fit into the store too well, so I might have to return with Alfie in the papoose. This store is absolutely jammed packed with everything from religious statues and prints, granny jackets and shoes, hand knits, glassware, furniture, Yugoslavian records, jewellery, leathergoods.... you name it!

By the time we got home, the Saturday afternoon classic film was on. Time for a cuppa and kip.

Get thee to Newport.

With love,
Ali