This is where is all started, on a lonely beach at Edithvale.
Sitting on the beach is fun, but after 25 years it wears a little thin ...
So I decided to head off to overseas. (Click on the thumbnails to see the full sized picture.)
London was the first stop, followed by a 21 day Contiki Tour of Europe.
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Who said psychedelia ended in the 60's? | ||
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Paris. | ||
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Italy. |
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Rome was even hotter - The Coliseum wasn't as big as the MCG! |
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There wasn't much to do on Sunday morning, so we dropped in to say g'day to the Pope. |
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Venice was a nice place to look at, but it was pretty stinky - here's a tip, don't drink the water! |
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Switzerland was lovely. |
After the Contiki tour, I stayed in Britain for another 3 weeks and toured Bristol, Wales, Blackpool and parts of Scotland.
After the travel bug had bitten, the itch didn't go away, so as soon as I returned from Europe, I started saving again. I arrived in California in late May and stayed until late July spending most of my time in Los Angeles, with a couple of trips to San Diego and a weekend in San Francisco.
As you can see from the picture below, the smog is horrendous - it's so bad that at night you can't even see the stars!
When I bought a block of land in late 1991, it looked like my overseas touring days were over. The house went up soon after and I moved into my mortgage zone in May 1992.
For the next 7 years the only travel I did was work related, although I sometimes managed to arrange it so that my visits were for either Monday or Friday which allowed me to spend a weekend interstate every now and then.
Most of my travel was to Sydney, but I went to Brisbane two or three times and hired a car one weekend and drove to the Gold Coast and stayed at Surfer's Paradise.
There is no truth to the rumours that I have had an involvement with the KGB and if anyone asks whether I've been to Moscow, my official response is "Nyet".
After almost 9 years at home, the opportunity to travel arose once again. In April 1999 I found myself on the plains of Eastern Alberta searching for a Buffalo herd. After roaming the prairie lands 200km east of Edmonton for almost a week, I finally found the Buffalos in Wainwright, in Eastern Alberta. Even though it was spring we still encountered some snow, which was an unusual experience for me.
Visit Ernie the Wonder Buffalo's site for more Buffalo and Bison information.
From the Buffalo prairies I headed east to Ontario, to Totonto and Niagara Falls. I mostly took video footage of this part of the tour, so there aren't that many pictures.
So far this century I've been concentrating on seeing more of Victoria. It's the old story - you travel all over the world and then come to the realisation that the best place is in your own backyard.
In the last 12 months I've travelled down the Great Ocean Road, been to the Dandenongs, Healesville, Phillip Island, Ballarat and probably a few more places before the year is over.
A 4 day business trip is not the easiest way to see the sights of a foreign country, but I managed to get a few snaps of the resort where I stayed in Pattaya.
Click here to read the offical IBM report on the trip.