On to Melbourne

We made a brief visit to the National Botanical Gardens this morning, which were lovely, before arriving at the airport for our noon flight to Melbourne.

Perfect weather greeted us on our mid-afternoon arrival, with partly cloudy skies and temperatures in the upper 20s Celsius (~ 85 F ). We checked into our 2 bedroom apartment overlooking the water at an area called the Docklands. It was new, modern and very nice with restaurants located along a promenade below us. We quickly dropped our luggage off and headed into town via one of the many trams that are used for public transport. Melbourne is definitely a tram city, with many modern electric trams which are used for transport in and out of the city.

We soon learned why Melbourne is called the shopping capital of Australia, as it has everything from fashion houses, to major department stores (one, in particular, that even rivals any we've seen in America), and unusual souvenir shops. It has the most European feel of any Australian city with many alleyways and old stone buildings. It is also the Southern Hemisphere's leading cuisine capital with a host of ethnic restaurants. We found ourselves in the Greek district where we enjoyed a delicious Greek dinner and scrumptious desserts--Marc and I agreed the tiramisu dessert was one of the best we've ever had. We walked home in balmy weather, still in the upper 20s Celsius. We discovered (not surprisingly!) that Melbourne has twice shared the top position in a survey by The Economist of "The World's Most Livable Cities".

Marce

Our view of the Melbourne Skyline from the Docklands