20 August 2011

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Tux and I were up first and agreed to visit the Botanical Gardens. Having walked down to the ferry point by Luna Park we found that we had a 20 minute wait for the first ferry at 9am. We walked to the Botanical Gardens and after a while came across the famous bats, which were surprisingly flying around in daylight. We then walked down to Macquiaires Point for some excellent photos of the opera house and bridge. We were amused to see a Chinese bride in her wedding dress having her photo taken with the wonderful background and being asked to stand on some rocks which meant she had to take her shoes off and walk through water, getting her dress wet in the process! We then had to walk mile back to the city to catch a cab back to the house.

Around 11.30 we walked down to Lavender Bay pontoon to catch our river taxi to Doyles. I should have mentioned before that in contrast to yesterday and what the weather forecast said, it was a wonderfully sunny day, which I was so happy about. The taxi arrived on time. It would have taken 21 but we had it all to ourselves. It took about 30 minutes to get to Watson’s Bay, which looked idyllic bathed in sun. As requested we had a table by the front and it took me no time at all to decide to have a hot & cold fish platter comprising a whole lobster, crab, prawns, smoked salmon, calamari and fish. Samantha, Neil and Tux also wanted one so we shared 2 between the 4 of us. The others had fish and chips and a prawn pasta dish. All this was washed down with some chardonnay. As before I was blown away with the setting especially given the wonderful weather we had been lucky enough to enjoy.

After lunch we had ideally wanted to head over to Manly but you can’t go by ferry directly there, so one of the waiter suggested we go to Rose Bay and hire a boat to take out ourselves. We were lucky enough to catch a cab that could take us all, but on the way there decided to divert instead to Bondi Beach. It was better than I remember before – not as tacky and dated. We wandered along the beach and Samantha and Neil had a paddle. There were a lot of surfers in the water and with a brisk wind coming in, a reasonable surf.

Eventally we decided to leave and tried to find another 7 seater taxi back but couldn’t find one. Michael, Eryl and I got in a taxi and went directly back and did a bit of shopping for supper. The others decided to get a separate taxi to Darling Harbour and to enjoy the firework at 8.30pm, although Samantha and Neil came back just beforehand. We watched the fireworks from jut down the road.

Spent the later part of the evening watching Arsenal/Liverpool on the box. Michael was again considering staying up till 2.30am to watch Chelsea.

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