Bondi, the Bridge, Beer... and more Beer...

  Sydney, Australia
Thursday, June 5, 2008

June 1st, the first day of the Australian winter, and my first morning in Sydney, where I'm lucky enough to be staying centrally with the lovely Vicki, and enjoying fresh coffee and toast on her balcony with its superb view of a triangular roof, just blocking the famous harbour bridge and city skyline.  John and I thought we'd try and remove a few roof tiles a day during our stay and see if the neighbours notice...  And on the subject of neighbours, Nicole Kidman lives around the corner and Russell Crowe just down the road... she's a classy woman is Vicki, moves in all the best circles... but unfortunately she forgot to let Russell know that I'm in town so there has been no invite for beer on his balcony... turned out Sydney had no shortage of other beer venues, though...

 

Along the walk to Manly

It was a cloudy but warm Sunday, a, a perfect day for a good walk, which was just what we had, along with Bec and Howard, an Aussie version of Jane and Chris, i.e. superhuman and thinking nothing of having cycled a mere 200 km the previous day (and you don't want to hear about their Paris-Brest ride, trust me...!).  Howard has been here since the 70's but is originally from Yorkshire, so he seemed like an ideal candidate for my first visa whinge of the day...



 
Starting at 'The Spit' we covered an easy 10 km around the water's edge to Manly.  Sydney is, of course, famous for its harbour but, never having looked at a map of the city, I hadn't realised that said harbour is made up of a multitude of bays and smaller harbours creating an extensive waterfront area, hugged by the city radiating

Beginning the tasting!

westwards.  It makes for great strolling, along both expansive and tiny beaches, through village-y areas, and even the odd section of bush in a stretch of National Park, with views over to similar landscapes across whichever bit of the bay you're in.  It was a lovely walk, with great company, but it got even better on arrival at Manly...  we'd earned ourselves a drink so we settled in at a slick waterfront bar and opted for the beer tasting selection, consisting of 5 glasses, each holding a different beer...meaning there were 20 beers on the table as we began.  I've never done beer this way, but I'll be doing it again!

Before...

...during...

...and after!

  

   

Wine tasting on the beach at Manly

The rain began as we started to drink but seemed to have stopped when we left, I'm not sure how much later,  me doing my wobbly wombat impression by now...  so we sauntered around the corner to the Manly Food and Wine Festival...ahhh, timing is everything!  The beach front street was thronged with people sampling wine, the glasses hanging from their necks in special holders, but it was a few dollars to buy these so I decided to sweet-talk my way into some freebies... you know what I'm like after a couple of beers...  full marks to Bec and Howard for their patience!

 

Bondi Junction station

Bondi... Bundoran?

Another coastal walk was on the cards the following day as we headed out to Bondi Beach... but winter had really  descended and it was lashing when we arrived, with a beach resembling the Bundoran of my memory more than the Bondi of my dreams.  We took refuge in 'Icebergs' bar, overlooking the tempest-tossed swimming pool, for a couple of

Ginger beer at Bondi

the pool

schooners of 'alcoholic ginger beer' - that was a new one for me but I'll be looking out for it again!   Continuing on, when the rain had abated (giggling more than after normal ginger beer), we wound our way around rocks, along cliffs, through a cemetery, past a frog swamp, and along wee beaches to our goal of calypso coffees at Coogee, by which point it was getting dark (at the end of one of our walks?  No surprise there, then...).  Time to try some night photography, with the aid of

Sydney Opera House at night

Sydney's night lights

That bridge

a couple of tripods, and there were some great shots to be had of the 'coathanger' and the opera house as we walked across Sydney Harbour Bridge and surveyed the city's nightlights.  And then it rained again so we had to sample another beer in another pub whilst sheltering from the elements... and then guess what happened a while later before we caught the ferry home?  Yes, another shower... another beer...

 

The Wiggles!

  The day we went to explore the city and see the big sights in the daylight, the harbour was so fog-bound that all ferries were cancelled and the rain had really set in with a vengeance. And  I don't mean showers, this was rain worthy of Sligo, so it seemed appropriate to visit one of Sydney's many Irish pubs and try and teach John to drink Guinness.  (Or drink anything at all, in fact... it's a myth that all Aussies can drink... this one opens 2 bottles of beer and while I lay into mine, he leaves his down as a table ornament and ignores it... Mick, your presence is urgently needed here!).  A few hours later it stopped raining (by which time we'd talked truckloads of garbage, tried to sing the Fields of Athenry in preparation for the rugby, harassed Mick by phone, been generally conspicuous, and, no doubt,described my visa woes to everyone in the vicinity...) and we emerged onto the dark street.

Guess which one's Johns, Mick!!

I was keen to see one of Sydney's renowned drag acts but it was the wrong night of the week, so instead we ended up in in a lively gay bar with a sleek-skinned plastic Adonis hanging from the corner of the room, clad in leopard skin loincloth, and a video displaying great numbers of smooth-chested males during the Gay Mardi-Gras.  Naturally, this prompted me to interrogate the barboy as to the status of his own chest rug... and why any man, of whatever inclination, would succumb to the practice of chest-waxing (which should be a criminal offence, in my eyes)...  and how the powers that be should forget creating visa obstacles for over-thirties, and tackle serious matters such as preventing all this unnecessary hair removal.  (Oh God, how does beer make me lose the run of my tongue so spectacularly...?  And how do so many people have the patience to tolerate it...?!)  By the end of that particular beer we had also been innocently photographed for a website that we probably don't want to appear on... yes, it was time to go!  

Pizza fit for a King!

dinner with Elvis!

There was still time for one last stop though... refuelling and soakage at 'Elvis Pizza'... does it get any better than this?...  late night pizza with Elvis on the big screen, singing along to every bite...a place where I could legally buy a 'hunk of burning love' (it was the veggie special)... where they actually welcomed my drunken request to play 'In the Ghetto' instead of just rolling their eyes...   I love this city!  (And yes, girls, there were 3 Elvis songs in a row several times over, but no Kilkenny result, I'm afraid!!!!!!!!)




 
My drinking partner has now absconded, with the feeble excuse of having to return to work, so I am taking this opportunity to take a break from the challenge of eating and drinking my way around the world's third largest country, at which I have excelled throughout the month since I arrived.  Perhaps, after a week of healthier intake, the jeans which fitted me a mere 3 weeks ago will once more be wearable, and my face may again resemble a boned structure rather than a football... watch this space...!