Melbourne

I love this town. You can tell as soon as you see the skyline of Melbourne that this is an extraordinary city – the downtown business area is full of the most interesting architecture. People places are mixed with business places and recreation places. Public buildings are as innovative as the commercial ones. Here, you can almost hear the architects and planners saying: How can we make the skyline more interesting and beautiful ? Instead of, what’s the cheapest way to get this built?

Federation Square, built in the heart of the downtown (left) to celebrate 100 years of nationhood in 2001, is ultra-modern, almost “space age’ in design. While is salutes the accomplishments of the past, it is clearly celebrating Melbourne’s future. I couldn’t get a camera angle that could show you the whole thing – so this is only a piece.
Melbourne actually reminds me a bit of San Francisco in terms of the mix of old architecture and new. Maybe it’s also the tram system. Shopping is phenomenal. Could spend days in the trendy downtown stores!

Thursday night I went to see Romeo and Juliet performed by the Australian Shakespeare Company at the Royal Botanical Gardens. I really enjoyed it ... except it ended the same way as all the others. I really wish someone would produce a happy ever after version just to see how that would work out for Verona ...

There are theatres everywhere - a lot of the big theatre houses are running big old musicals, like guys and dolls, but there are lots of other theatre companies doing there own thing. And, the annual Food and Wine Festival is on. What can I say? I love this town.