Five Seven One

Melbourne Australia has a feeling of prosperity, leisure, balance, daring, community, and health. I have not visited many cities that embody all of these attributes. The people are friendly and although they have one of the most rapidly growing economies in the world, they seem to have not lost sight of the value of life outside the workplace. At night the streets and parks are teaming with people enjoying life outside the home. Melbourne has several places for people to congregate and enjoy art, film, music, you name it you can find it on any given night.

What can I say that hasn’t been said about Arches National Park? Featured in literature, paintings, films, commercials, and thousands upon millions of photographs. Almost every person I have spoken to in my life that has done any traveling in the western United States has made the trip to arches, and rightfully so. The park is home to over 2,000 natural sandstone arches and just as many more unusual sandstone formations created by millions of year’s geological events.

Little Sahara Recreation Area in Utah is one of my favorite places in world. Created by left over deposits from the Sevier River, which flowed into Lake Bonneville over 15,000 years ago, this one hundred and twenty four mile square living dune system is heading north at the rate of 9 feet per year. The nearest services for the area are in Eureka and nearest major city and airport are located in Salt Lake, which is 115 miles south.

Kangaroo Island is located of the coast of southern Australia. The nearest major city is Adelaide and is easily accessible by ferry or plane. If you are taking a rental car to the island by ferry be sure to make a reservation. I have listed the ferry service contacts at the end of the article. The Island boasts 318 miles of coastline and 1680 square miles of very diverse terrain. A population of 4259 friendly laidback residents gives the Island an atmosphere of a sleepy small town. Every time we passed a local driver coming the opposite direction they would wave, something I am definitely not accustomed to here in NYC.