Docklands, view from the after-work Friday drinks behind our office.
Fall is my favourite season. Having the chance to leave the heat behind and spend a fall weekend in Melbourne was an unexpected yet very welcome opportunity. As I walked out of the hotel the first night, the air felt clean and fresh, the streets were quiet because "at that time of the night, kitchen is closed" as a restaurant owner told me - it was 9.30PM, for the record.
Despite the tight timing - weekdays full-day locked in office 8-19, I managed to see quite a lot but, more importantly, to recover a bit the joy of travel by walking the city, a passion I discovered in Stockholm. Here in Bangkok is not so easy to take really long walks - as you can easily do in Stockholm or Tokyo, neither it is in Malaga. The less you do something, the more you miss it.
I find a tremendous joy on observing one neighbourhood morph into another, as you move along the veins of the big metropolis, step by step. Enrique's pictures do a better job than mine when it comes to capturing the awe of finding beauty hidden behind unexpected corners, that you would otherwise miss if moving faster.
My route was somewhat random, but I walked around the city center, exploring both street-art and arcades, all the way to Carlton where I stopped for dinner in the Italian (Lygon) street, at the highly rated Tiamo.
Southern Cross station.
Cool bar inside an old electric central.
Free trams, a Melbourne classic.
Rainy streets, tram tracks.
St Paul's Cathedral, a Gothic Revival masterpiece completed in 1891.
Flinders street station, Melbourne's first train station since 1854 and origin of the Melbourne phrase around the most popular rendezvous "meet me under the clocks"
Federation Square fractal patterned buildings.
Beautiful view of the Yarra River that undulates in Melbourne.
Federation Bells, a set of 39 bronze bells located in Birrarung Marr, that play the Melbourne song everyday 8-9, 12.30–1.30PM and 5–6 pm.
Rainy skyline
Commonwealth merchandising.
Colourful buildings
Old and new contrasts.
Carlton Baths, beautiful bricky building hosting a public swimming facility since 1904.
Royal exhibition building, a Unesco heritage site from 1880, located in the lovely Carlton gardens.
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