Sydney, Home & Away

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Our first day in Sydney was spent in Mona Vale Hospital. No, it’s not normally on the tourist trail but Michelle took a pearler on the beach whilst exploring rock pools our first morning in Sydney (we had arrived in the dark the night before) and broke her wrist on landing. Yikes, poor thing – it did look dreadfully deformed but fortunately it materialised that it was a clean break and only required plastering and no surgery thank goodness. What I have to say is that the friendliness & kindness of the people on the beach, who witnessed the accident, and the staff in the hospital, was overwhelming. A couple of girls rushed Michelle & Andrew to the hospital and another lady then found me (I was back doing chores at the motor home when this accident happened) and led myself, Ellen & Adam to the hospital. They are obviously geared up for water-sports in Oz and Michelle later had it reset in a swish waterproof plaster which meant she could still swim and shower – ingenious and apparently yet to be available in the UK. This event meant our travel schedule was put on hold and we were forced to spend a week longer in Sydney – oh well, every cloud has a silver lining!

The hospital was not far from Palm Beach, the fictional town of Summer Bay from ‘Home & Away’ so we left the hospital to hang out at the Summer Bay Surf Club & Diner with the hopes of spotting Alf Stewart or Marilyn! This beach is the northern most of a string of beautiful beaches which run along the peninsula stretching north from Sydney. It is a wonderful spot because the land is only a few hundred yards wide at this point so is bordered on the East by the South Pacific (Tasman Sea actually) and on the west by Pittwater and the Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park. Palm Beach / Pittwater (named after British Prime Minister William Pitt) despite being a suburb of the metropolis of Sydney consists of sparkling azure waters and flourishing native flora and fauna very much nurtured and protected by residents. A small ferry provides access to Kurangaichase wilderness.

We went round to Ku-ring-gai Chase and the headland West Head which provides spectacular scenic views back over Pittwater and into the estuary of the Hawkesbury River. It gives an idea of what the European settlers were faced with 200 years earlier – extreme beauty but an incredibly harsh rugged landscape. The area abounds with aboriginal rock engraving, cave paintings and middens from the Garigal aborigine tribe, again wiped out by smallpox. The park was opened in 1894 – incredible that people had the foresight to protect such areas at that time (puts our ‘green belt’ areas to shame). It means that people in the city of Sydney have unrivalled access to wild countryside on their doorstep and all the adventures that provides – walking, boating, and seclusion. There are clusters of secretive, winding creeks, sheltered beaches, hidden coves and wide expanses of deep blue water. There are heathlands on the sandstone ridges, dense forests on the slopes, and mangroves on the tidal mudflats. We came across more wildlife including some large goanna lizards, one of which startled Adam when it chased him - Adam can move quickly at the best of times but I’ve never seen him move so quickly as when this creature turned and chased him!!! These lizards typically climb trees when under threat and have been known to climb up people they mistake for trees... It’s a beautiful place and we spent a while just gazing at the views. Oh, guess what – another claim to fame is that it was the filming location of ‘Skippy the Bush Kangaroo’ where it was known as Duffy’s Forest (I loved that series when I was a nipper, anyone remember it?).

Whilst I dealt with medical insurance & flight reschedules the rest of the family went to Taronga Zoo – poor Michelle was in pain & needed cheering up. I made very slow progress as everything was online and internet connection was not available – loony as we had good connection in very isolated places no worries, but now not in Sydney itself! Hhmph - evidently Telstar was down, internet is wonderful went it works but when broken I was left helpless to deal with things, the 12 hour time difference did not help either. Meanwhile the family had a good day at Taronga, an aboriginal word which means ‘beautiful view’ and indeed it has amazing views of the Sydney harbour & skyline.

That evening we met up for a meal with Matt & Sally and other old mates. Matt & Sally were friends from Rothamsted - their lifestyle here is a tad different to their old place in Cross Farm, Southdown, Harpenden and I don’t suppose they regret their move here made some years ago! The other friends were people Andrew worked with at the University of New South Wales donkeys years ago – he spent 7 months living and working there as a lecturer in genetics and entomology. Matt & Sally have a beautiful house on the shores of Narabeen lakes and it was fun to see the bilbys and possums in the trees in their garden! It appears that scientific research in Oz is also on the decline with much reduced funding and the closure of many university courses & departments such as entomology. However, overall unemployment is low and there is much funding in other areas.

Next day we went down to the south side of Sydney harbour to meet up with another ex-Rothamsted colleague who has made the sensible move out here. Lisa was a summer student working with me ten years back and also a favourite baby-sitter to Ellen & Michelle when they were small and it was great to meet up with her again. She kindly took us kayaking in Rose Bay from where there are fabulous views of Sydney Opera House & the Harbour Bridge – awesome! In fact, this is Lisa’s daily commute to work where she is based in the city centre, by ferry not kayak! And I can’t imagine a nicer more chilled journey to work. That evening Lisa treated us to a cool experience by taking us to the Tropfest film festival held in the Domain Park by the Botanical Gardens near the Opera House. Tropfest is the world’s largest short film festival, free and attended by numerous Ozzy celebs such as Nicole Kidman, Jeffrey Rush and Cate Blanchett on this occasion (and someone looking very much like Einstein was sat behind us!). Films must be shorter than 7 minutes and on a theme, this year the theme was the light bulb. Some had very tenuous links to a light bulb and some as you can imagine were quite bizarre. It was such fun to experience, with the back drop of the Sydney CBD skyline and with the flying foxes swooping round the trees as dusk fell. We had to make a quick run for it though as a huge electrical storm swept in – we have never experienced lightning like it anywhere, quite incredible and a bit hairy to sleep in our motor home as it continued through the night.

Another day we took the ferry from Manly to circular Quay – the classic route into the city which provides wonderful views of the famous landmarks. Again, we found ourselves being reminded of another film this time ‘Finding Nemo’ when Marlin & Dory arrive to find Nemo and the pelicans were there too! The Sydney Opera House really is a wonderful piece of architectural art, shiny white and perfect proportions – it is an iconic place and it beauty quite takes the breath away. The tiles are self-cleaning and it is actually comprised of 5 separate buildings (although they appear to be one whole) containing various size concert halls, and was completed in 1973. Adam again seemed to be the centre of attention for many Asian tourists there who requested they have their photo taken with him!

On walking through the city you get a sense of the vibrancy of this place, its colourful buskers and – it gave me a sense of the energy & passion of the people who live here. Hyde Park was a lovely place to sit in the shade and watch the colourful passers-by, there is even a Speakers Corner. We visited the Rocks area which was for a long tome a slum area but now gentrified with pubs & many smart restaurants out of our price range! There are historic buildings such as Cadman’s Cottage, the oldest building in Sydney (not even 200 years old!) and on the site of the original shoreline which has much changed over the years.

It had also been my turn too to suffer in sympathy with Michelle as I was subjected to a painful fractured tooth. I visited a local dentist, not the one from Finding Nemo fortunately, who whipped the culprit tooth out for me – I was much relieved! We had also said farewell to Daphne and moved into a small cabin for our extra stay, much more appropriate for me & Michelle to recover from our ailments.

It was now the end of a fabulous adventure in Australia; we have met many relatives and seen some wonderful sights. Australia is a land of such opportunity and excitement and we have enjoyed it very much. Now we thought it time to give the children a culture shock and pay a visit to Bangkok!

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Comments

[Rose]

I want to go back!!!
Thank you for reminding me of all the wonderful places in and around Sydney - my home for a year and I loved it...

[Sarah P]

I can just see you there Rose - it suits your sense of fun and energy for life!