Sightseeing

G'Day!

Hope your new year is off to a nice start.  I'm enjoying my free time in Sydney.  I've explored funky Newtown with lots of shops for several kilometers on King Street.  Lots of ethnic restaurants, import stores, massage, skin care and nail care salons, "antique" shops, music and book stores.  You name it, it's somewhere on King Street.  Went into Newtown Garden Center, an independent.  Small in terms of square footage but crammed, literally, with plants.  It was difficult to move, let alone bend over to look at plants, without brushing against other plants.  But it did have a wide variety of plants, garden art, and supplies.  And the owner was friendly.

Walked through another neighborhood to get to Marrickville Metro Shopping Centre.  KMart is an anchor store while McDonalds and KFC occupied the food court.  There was also an EB Electronic Boutique store.  It almost could have been an older mall somewhere in America.  Half of the mall consisted of food related stores with specialty food shops including a green grocer, bakery, butcher, a sandwich/cold food deli, and a cooked meat deli.  Grocery stores are often located very close to each other and this mall included a Woolworths and an Aldi.  At least 10 different fast food booths joined Mickey D's and KFC in the food court.  The rest of the mall was typical with a large bookstore, travel agency, women's shoe store, a shoe repair shop, several women's clothes stores, a few of men's/sports stores, 2 low end jewelry stores/kiosks, a Claire's-like accessory store, and Tek's (a cross between $1 store and Big Lots closeout store).

 I've seen some really weird looking birds.  These are ibis and rails.

I visited Sydney Park twice, once to see the fireworks (one of the highest points near downtown Sydney) and once to explore.    http://www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/residents/ParksAndLeisure/ParksPublicOpenSpace/SydneyPark.asp  I read about it and it sounded well-planned, environmentally responsible and nice.  It used to be a clay quarry/brick making operation and some of the equipment (silo/kilns) is still there.  Sydney Park is huge and made up of smaller specific use parks. There is a section that is a mini roadway with lane markers, traffic signs/signals etc. for bikers/drivers to practice in a safe place.  What a great idea!

The Hogwarts Whomping Tree at U of Sydney

Playgrounds for different age groups were clustered in one corner of the park.  A 2-poled rope climbing web with bridge looks like fun and is geared to older children.  I can't see one of these in a California park.  The center poles are probably 5 meters high; I can't recall seeing anything higher than 8' in American playgrounds.  All the equipment looked new and safety appropriate probably even to American (litigious) standards.

Throughout the park, landscaping included areas to catch rainwater runoff including a creek bed through the playground area, a wetlands area with rushes and a raised boardwalk, and holding dams in the lower central area.  Although there are large expanses of lawn, the weather probably takes care of it most of the time and water from the dams is probably used the rest of the time.

Hogwarts in Sydney?

I met up with my German wwoofer friend, Leonie, and her bro, Jacob.  We visited University of Sydney.  One of the buildings looks like Hogwarts with gargoyles and spires etc.    Later, we saw the Whomping Tree.  There is also a long graffiti tunnel on campus that is ... covered with graffiti.  I didn't see graffiti anywhere else on campus, so maybe it really works.  We also visited a great little art gallery with original Picasso, Matisse, Rodin, Renoir drawings.


Twin sis, Sandy, is coming in 2 days!!  Can't wait!

See ya!
Cyn