Public Transport
Just to clear something up. Our optimism that travel throughout Sydney was limited to A$1 per trip turned out to be naive.
When you tap in, the Sydney system takes that A$1 immediately to prove the card is valid. When you tap out, the sytem knows your journey and calculates the cost and charges the balance to the same card. Exactly the same as London; however unlike London, the journey isn’t charged at the point you tap out, it can take up to 4 days for it to appear in your bank. So it all gets very confusing as to what trip each fee relates to. Bonkers in a world where everything is real-time now.
Call your emissary back Sadiq!
Cockatoo Island
Clouds were plentiful over Sydney on Friday, even the swimming pool had turned a pale shade of green, although I’m not sure the two events are connected.
Abandoning our plans for a beach trip, we headed to Circular Quay to hop on a ferry to somewhere, and after studying the timetables, decided on a trip to Cockatoo Island.
Cockatoo Island has worn several hats since the 19th century — first a convict penal establishment, then a reformatory school, and later one of Australia’s major shipyards. For over a century it was a place of hard labour and heavy industry, playing a key role in naval shipbuilding.
Now part of Sydney Harbour’s cultural landscape, the island is a UNESCO-listed heritage site where cranes and dry docks sit alongside art installations and harbour views. Visitors explore tunnels and old workshops by day — or even camp overnight with the skyline glittering across the water. Industrial past, prime real estate setting.
It was a short ride over to the Island, stopping along the way at Balmain, Birchgrove, Greenwich Point, Woolwich and finally Cockatoo Island.
Don’t think flora and beaches, more a weird combination of an old Prison and a ship yard. A fascinating walk around the island though, where you are free to roam where you wish.
Hopping back on the Ferry, we decided to head to the Barangaroo ferry wharf, next to King Street Wharf & Darling Harbour in search of some buzz. It was suggested by Lucy’s sister Sophie, who is living here in Sydney, and it was a great recommendation.
A stroll along the harbour side, and we settled in Barangaroo House, which has 3 bars on different levels, where we enjoyed a couple of happy hour schooners and watched the Sydneysider’s pass by, we do love people watching. Very buzzy bar, especially on a Friday, with lots of people stopping off after work for some refreshments.
Next stop dinner, and a return to the ‘new’ Sydney Fish Market which only opened mid-January this year. A short ferry hop over to Blackwattle Bay Wharf, and a brief stroll around the shoreline and we had arrived.
There are 149 miles of shoreline around Sydney, most of which are serviced by numerous ferries, and we have really enjoyed our trips over the water around Sydney today, and are more than a little jealous of those that live here with all this on their doorstep.
Back to the fish market where we munched our way through a grill combo, which included fish, calamari, prawns, cooked oysters and octopus, yummy. We also got chatting to the couple sat next to us, the lady just having returned from the UK visiting her daughter who is on a two year visa, teaching at an infant school in Marylebone.
I must say, that we have found the Australians super friendly and very helpful
Heading back to Kings Cross, we stopped at our ‘local’, what a find – Bar Hernandez. A ‘proper’ Spanish bar serving cold beers, tapas and Negroni and with happy hour starting at 10pm, awesome !!!!
Exploring
On Saturday we had a later start and took a walk to Double Bay where Steve’s brother Mike lived for a while in the early nineties.
What the map didn’t tell us was that the route involved a hill that required ropes and crampons. To say we were breathless at the summit would be an understatement, though probably the lack of oxygen up there didn’t help!
Double Bay is obviously one of the wealthier Sydney suburbs because as we sat outside Mike’s old local, the Royal Oak, expensive cars just kept rolling by. Being a Saturday, it was clearly a “ladies that lunch” day as there were some fancy dressers out there too. The Sharon Watts effect has clearly reached Sydney because some of the dresses on the larger ladies were not what you might call flattering.
“Oh, we need a fresh loaf” says Nikki. Found a bakers round the corner, Steve nips off and returns with a £6.50 loaf. Did we mention this must be one of the wealthier suburbs.
For the evening we decided to join the Lunar New Year celebrations in Haymarket and Chinatown. Lots of stalls in the street selling all sorts of crap, but we enjoyed the famous Paddy’s market, its vibrancy and the crap it also sells. Nikki bought a handbag there in 1985. Enough said!
Linked to it is the Hay St market which is like the Time Out markets you see around the world. Lots of food and drink vendors with seats throughout to sit and quaff. Unfortunately, it took 20 minutes of queuing to get first drink – Steve thinks I’ll do a shrewdly and get a double round – 2 beers for Nikki and 2 Margaritas for himself. Carry them back to table Nikki has found and promptly drop the margaritas. Managed to save enough for a bit of a slurp, but not worth the effort! Ok, there’s a place selling pizza slices over there and no-one queuing. Steve dives over, orders and pays, and is then told to collect at opposite window where, you’ve guessed it – there’s a great big fricking queue.
Watched a couple of dances and thought sod this, and headed back to our new fave Bar Hernandez.
The Domain
On Sunday we decided on a couple of tourist things in an area called the Domain.
We started with a walk around the Sydney Botanic Gardens. We like a botanic garden, but were a tad underwhelmed and would rank this behind our favourite in Cambridge and the one we visited last year in Scotland, the Garden of Inverewe.
Our visit was not helped by the fact that one of our reasons for going, the world’s largest garden wall, the Calyx, was closed for a private event. Still the weather was fair and we took some nice pictures.
From there we walked up past the State Library, the State Parliament and the Sydney Mint to Hyde Park Barracks. This is well worth a visit because they tell the story of Governor Macquarie and his efforts to bring some order to Sydney back in the early 18th century. It was fascinating to see how the convicts were pressed into working to start the building of the city and the rank conditions that they had to live in. The exhibition is so professional and immersive.
After our tourist trail we headed to Darling Harbour and George’s Mediterranean. It’s ironic that on our couple of visits to Zante in the last few years we have been unable to find a Greek Mezze as Steve remembers from holidays in his twenties. Come to Australia though and we find it with no problem. It was delicious but as we always do, we were unable to finish it all.
We must be absorbing Aussie lifestyle by osmosis because by 9pm we were done and heading back to Kings Cross. You can put the chairs on the tables now George! Or so Steve thought as he left his back pack behind so one Uber became 3 Uber. Scheise.
