Saigon

Saigon's official name is Ho Chi Minh City, but apparently that is really only used by the Government and by taxi drivers who hate Americans (from our experience). Saigon was noisy, dirty and very busy, but still pretty fun.

Here's a view of a typical street in Saigon.













The traffic in Saigon is incredibly hectic. While there are lines painted on the street, and sometimes street lights, these are frequently not adhered to. As for crossing the street, you just have to take a decision and walk across, and hopefully you won't get hit...

In front of the Reunification Palace













The most beautiful room in the palace...so said our tour guide.

















The palace has a shooting range in the basement, along with a series of small rooms with various equipment, such as typewriters, radios, and other vintage things...











Here's Flora when we stopped to eat at the market. The food is incredibly cheap in Vietnam; this bowl of pho costs $1.
















Gerald in front of the garden at the Hotel de Ville (People's Committee Building).













Some interesting architectural juxtapositions...

Melbourne

Thank you Simon!!! Simon is one of Geoff and Brigette (or "Bagel" as all of the Aussies call her) friends, who took us in for a night as we were passing through Melbourne. He showed us some cool spots, and was very helpful!


Part of the Melbourne skyline. For those who don't know, in Australia it's pronounced "Melbin"












Federal Square. There was a lot of people there and around Melbourne that day, as it was ANZAC day, a holiday.











Good Australian coffee at federal square...cool architecture.
nice but a bit chilly autumn day.











Melbourne Museum. We just walked by and it looked cool...












Simon lives in North Fitzroy, which is a pretty trendy/hipster neighborhood. Because of this, we saw quite a few old cars, and more vintage clothing stores than we could count...

Canberra - Australia's Fabulous Capital

A nice couple of bird enjoying Geoff's parent's pomegranates!

A little hike in Hackett, suburb of Canberra

A small sampling of wild kangaroos, they are everywhere!!!

This is part of a grand axis through Canberra, connecting the new and old Parliament Houses, plus the War Memorial and probably some other things...
















Canberra features a large man-made lake with nice, green areas to walk around.

















This was one of the extremely bizarre things for us coming to Australia. The temperature in D.C. was about the same as it was in Canberra, but the leaves were turning colors and falling off of the trees. It really gave us a weird feeling, because our minds were expecting summertime...








This is the War Memorial in Canberra, which has a pretty cool museum in it. There are some neat dioramas depicting scenes from the first two world wars, and then there's a huge space where they have some airplanes hanging from the ceiling, as well as a Japanese midget submarine. Apparently, there were a couple of these midget subs in Sydney's harbor during WWII, causing some serious trouble. Brigette says that this museum is Geoff's favorite place to go, which is understandable...










An old tank outside of the Canberra War Memorial...

Day 1

Watson's Bay, view of the Sydney Skyline

Bondi Beach

Sydney...Arrival

Airplane view of the Australian cost right before hitting Sydney airport.