On the way into Melbourne, we were stopped in a traffic jam and so were able to take a picture of this wire picture / sculpture thingie. It certainly gets your attention.
Suburban train near where we were staying. If you want to read a history of how Australia finished up with three rail gauges, 3'6", 4'8" and 5'3", read here. It's definitely not a good example of forward thinking, planning and cooperation.
Parking spots in the area are very scarce. Imagine it's 5:50 pm on Friday, what can you do? The P means one hour. The answer is you can come back in 10 minutes and park for two hours.
Fancy house and gate.
Melbourne made a wise choice and kept it's trams. They are very convenient.
Inside the Prahran market. It's not a huge market, but it is wonderful to explore.
Large mushrooms. Those at the top would be 6" across.
Many locals use these trolleys to cart their purchases home.
Australia is virtually closed to foreign imports of fruit and vegetables so all the produce is relatively local and has been grown for taste rather than ability to travel. This is the prime reason why food tastes so good in Oz.
Back in 1975, lamb chops were 5 lb for a dollar.
This is where we lived back in 1975, middle floor at the back. The flat was pretty basic but adequate.
As we trying to take photos of our former abode, this woman in the house next door was a little concerned about what we were doing. We explained and she subsequently invited us in for a cup of coffee. She worked in the marketing department of Melbourne Uni and had bought the house from the former Greek owners back in 1980. She had done a wonderful job of fixing the place up over the years.
View of our unit from the back of the lady's house. Since I had a clothes drier, we did not have to drape our washing over the railing. Marianne was not convinced however since the drier was quite puny in it's capacity to actually dry clothes. Australians ability to actually recognize and deal with cold weather is quite suspect.
Each weekday, this was my walk to work across Fawkner Park.
It's filled with playing fields and here are some people playing cricket.
There are lots of wonderful old trees that line the paths.
One feature of the park is the forks in the paths. You really need to know which one to take.
I find that a good conversation stopper these days is to mention that I used to work for BP. Yes, the same crew responsible for the oil leak. This used to be their headquarters in Australia and it was a wonderful building to work in with marvelous views. BP sold it off years ago and it is now filled with units.
The next few photos were taken in Domain Street near Fawkner Park. Enjoy.
I enjoyed the lunatic cat. Note the top sign about using a rain water tank. The prolonged drought in Australia resulted in sever water restrictions. Use of city water for watering of plants was prohibited and so keen gardeners installed rain water tanks so that they could water their gardens. There are not too many people in Oz who are skeptical about climate change.
Matching old Jaguar cars for a bridal party. They were just drop dead gorgeous and would have to be worth a mint of money. They appear to be Mark V Drophead Coupes.
Australia is infested with red light and speed cameras. Actually, it works very well since traffic moves exactly at the speed limit and speeders are very uncommon.
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