Melbourne, Australia.
Sorry if this entry is a bit strange…I haven’t had my morning coffee yet and I feel a little bit spacy.
It’s our second day in this city. Yesterday we walked around the hood (South Yarra) and I had my straggly hair trimmed and Casey bought some flip-flopish slides so that his feet can enjoy the warm weather. We decided to walk to the City Center (not quite realizing how long it would take us) and spent the next two and a half hours strolling the streets of Melbourne. It’s a pretty city, but a lot dirtier than New Zealand. In NZ there was never any trash on the streets or large amounts of cigarette butts on the ground; in that respect, Melbourne looks like any other American city. In fact, Casey was saying that Australia seemed a lot more American than any place we have been to so far. But, it’s not all bad–as we walked along, we were shaded from the hot sun by beautiful trees and enjoyed the old brick buildings. However, we did not enjoy the “plague of flies” (to quote Casey’s on-target description) that bombarded us as we made our way through the parks and small stretches of green grass. We seriously thought that the little buggers were attacking only us; then we saw other people swatting the air around them, too. We made it to the City Center and immediately booked two more nights in Melbourne, but CLOSER to the action! We didn’t want to have to take such a long walk again. (Exercise is one thing, but heat exhaustation is quite another.)
I must go wake up Casey now. Today we check out of Hotel Claremont and we need to eat our “included breakfast” before we pack it all up (or, in).