Melbourne was just hit by the most ferocious of storms that I have ever seen here. For around 15 minutes ferocious gusts of wind and heavy rain and hail bucketed down over Melbourne with some of the hail stones the size golf balls. People on the streets were frantically running for cover as small tree branches and leaves were seemingly falling from the sky. The State Emergency Service (SES) is going to have a busy night tonight.

Below is a photo of Dudley St on the edge of Melbourne’s CBD just after the aftermath of storm.

If I had to sum up New York City in one word it would be WOW! It’s such an amazing city with so much on offer. It is a place that I will definitely be visiting again hopefully in the not too distant future.

After the 7.5 hour flight from London to New York on British Airways (I won’t be flying them again after their shitty service) we arrived at JFK airport and hopped into a cab headed for Queens where our hotel was located. We stayed at the Country Inn & Suites by Carlson just across the East River for six nights. The hotel was excellent and it was also so much cheaper to stay across the river in Queens compared to Manhattan. Our room had a great view of the city as well.

While in New York we did the typical touristy things and visited Times Square, Central Park, Grand Central Station (that was for lunch at the Grand Central Oyster Bar which was yummo), Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, the Rockefeller Centre, Chinatown and we even caught a Rangers game at Madison Square Garden which was a great experience. We also made the trip downtown to Coney Island and ate at Nathan’s Famous hot dogs. I’ve heard Coney Island mentioned so many times in movies and TV shows that I had to go and check the place out. It was well worth it too.

In all the places I have visited I have to say New York ranks right up there amongst my favourites. It’s a city with so much to do and offers so much of everything. Getting around is so easy with the great subway system. It’s definitely a place I’ll be visiting again.

It’s already March 2010 and it’s definitely been way too long since my last post. Since coming back to Melbourne from London late October last year I’ve been so busy getting my life back on track and haven’t had much time to blog.

I’ve got some time now so I thought I’d start the New Year (a couple of months late I know haha) with some posts. On the way home from London to Melbourne my girlfriend and I stopped over in New York, LA and Las Vegas. For the sake of keeping the size of this post sane I’ll be writing up a separate post for each city.

Anyways, to kick things off here’s a photo of a globe that I took in the old immigration centre on Ellis Island, New York/New Jersey. I thought it would be a good idea to point out my current location just in case anyone doesn’t know where Melbourne is.

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of visiting Richmond Park in London. I had never been there before or heard anything about the park beforehand so when I saw herds of deer roaming freely it was so amazing. The animals looked so timid and beautiful. They’re wild and get frightened easily so getting good shots of them wasn’t easy. This park is definitely worth a visit for anyone visiting London.

I recently got back from a road trip through Great Britain and man it was amazing. The trip covered England, Scotland and Wales. The main places we visited were Liverpool, Manchester, Edinburgh, the Lake District, Queen Elizabeth Forest Park (near Aberfoyle), Cardiff and Caerphilly. All up we drove nearly 1,400 miles. I was so over driving by the end of it but it was definitely all worth it. Here are some of the photos from the trip.