On Tuesday morning, one of the locals visited the tree right next to our outdoor patio

Tom continues to be fascinated by the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. Here are some photos taken during the Monday (March 31) bike ride

Circular Quay

The Opera House peeking out from behind some majestic pineapple palms

The full-on view of the Opera House and steps

An interesting “artsy” shot

Lots of tiles!!

Close up view of the tiles

Harbourside walk leading to the Opera House

Sunday was a warm and gorgeous day – perfect for a morning cycle, a leisurely coffee and brunch in the park with the cycling group, and then a trip out to Wylie’s Baths for swimming in the afternoon.

Amazingly calm seas – this rock outcropping is called “Wedding Cake Island”

A busy afternoon at Wylie’s

Coogee beach with almost no surf

Sunday night we actually ran into a friend of ours at dinner at the local pub. Des is a retired Qantas executive, who cycles with the club. He is the curator of the Qantas museum at the airport, and last year he gave us an individual tour of the museum before our flight home. We didn’t realize that Des lived so close by, and it was really nice to spend some time with him that evening. Although we really do like each other, after 5 weeks together, we do appreciate company and some lively conversation!!

Friday night we were invited to dinner at our friends’ home. We met Jeff and Erin through the Sydney Cycling Club – in fact, Jeff was instrumental in making the club rides available to Tom over the last 5 years, as he was the club Captain in 2004, when we first began spending winters in Australia.

Besides being a doctor and a very serious and accomplished cyclist, Erin is an amazing chef. She fixed a fabulous meal topped off with homemade Tiramisu for dessert! They have a lovely condo in a very nice part of town. Their view looks out over the harbour, and at dusk, the bats fly right by their windows on the evening foray to the parks for feeding. We stood out on the patio to watch them and they came so close you could almost reach out and touch them.

Saturday evening, we rode our bikes out to a cycle track called Hefron – about 10k from where we are living – to watch the cycle races. Erin was racing, and was the only woman in her group. Here’s a picture of her (she’s the fifth cyclist from the left) on one of the 16 laps they took around the track. It was great fun to watch the races and I was very inspired by Erin’s performance.


Weird shadow people fooling around with the camera


Erin – in third place – with huge thundercloud in the background

A wedding procession in Centennial Park on Friday (March 28)

On Wednesday, we went back to Wylie’s Baths to visit Smokey the cat and to go for a swim and snorkel. It was high tide, so there were lots of fish in the pool, as well as the usual anemones, sea urchins, sea cucumbers and shells. There’s a small octopus that lives in the pool, and I saw him!! His body is about the size of a grapefruit, with legs about 18-20 inches long. When he’s not being shy, he crawls around the bottom of the pool, trying to pry the sea snails and other crustaceans from their perches. It was fascinating to watch him. Here’s a less than flattering photo of me with my snorkel watching the world below. (Thanks, Tyrone, for the great swimsuit – I’ve been wearing it non-stop!!)

We were invited to dinner on Wednesday night by our friend, Dan Tess, who is from Missouri, but lives and works here in Sydney. Dan visited us in Seattle last June, and it was good to see him again. He’d just finished a huge project for work, so we hadn’t seen him cycling thus far. We met at a great English style pub, and then had dinner at a great bistro. It was a very enjoyable evening.

Thursday evening, we went to Darling Harbour for dinner. We’ve been faithfully using our Entertainment Book as a guide for our dinners out, and we hadn’t dined in this part of town yet. The restaurant is situated right on the boardwalk that lines the inlet, so you can sit outside and enjoy the people watching, as well as the smell of the sea and the great sunsets.
Here’s a view looking back into the business district – just to the right of the IBM building is the PWC building, where Dan works.

As twilight approaches, all the neon and lights along the boardwalk come on and create wonderful reflections in the water.

A paddle-wheeler getting ready to depart on a dinner cruise

Yes, even Sydney does have its dark rainy days. On Tuesday (March 25) we took a short bush walk around the edge of the South Head, which is the entrance to Sydney Harbour. To get there, we took a ferry to Watson’s Bay, and then walked along the foreshore up toward the lighthouse on the point.From this point, you can barely see the Sydney skyline under the dark clouds.

Just around the corner from busy Watson’s Bay lies this little beach, a pristine and safe place for a swim.

The stairway to Sydney’s nude beach – we didn’t check it out!!

Watching the storm come in over the ocean – looking at the U.S. from 7000+ miles away

The seas were angry that day, my friends

Looking at this gorgeous view of Sydney reminds me that seeing the beauty here is only part of the experience of being here. It’s one thing to attempt to describe sights and to show pictures; another thing completely to try to capture in words the sounds, smells, tastes and feelings of this most wonderful place. Whenever we come here, I’m reminded anew of the fabulous bird sounds that are heard during all the daylight hours and into the twilight. It may sound corny to say that it’s like a symphony, but that is truly the best parallel I can provide. Some of the most ordinary looking birds have the prettiest songs.

And, who wouldn’t enjoy the typical smells of summer – newly mown lawns, the heat from the asphalt as it burns under 82 degree sunshine, the salty fresh smell of the ocean, the delicious aroma of barbecues in the park, the musky odor of the bats in the Botanical Garden, the permeating sweet smell of the frangipani (plumeria) trees that seem to be in everyone’s garden – and all this in February and March!!

For all my “foodie” friends out there – Sydney is a must for the gastronomical experience. Tom & I struggle to lose/maintain weight - even though we cycle everyday, and walk just about everywhere. There are so many great choices, and the fresh vegetables and fruits in Australia are some of the best around.

Probably the hardest thing to put into words is the feeling of being here. How can one portray the feeling of the warm wind blowing across your skin, or the breeze as you ride your bike down a hill? How do you describe the thrilling sensation of jumping into the ocean and experience that moment of shockingly cool water, only to have your body adjust to the temperature within seconds? Just breathing here is an experience everyone should have at least once during their lifetime.

I truly hope that each and every one of you will come here and experience all this for yourselves – do it soon!!! You’ll want to come back again and again!

It’s Monday again, so Tom & I took our weekly ride – after a nice sleep-in, due to thunderstorms and rain in the A.M. By 11 it had dried off (and warmed up) enough for us to go. Since Easter Monday is a holiday in Australia, we decided it would be a good time to cycle through the city and over the Harbour Bridge. Since Tom has the camera most of the time, the photos are more often of me, although I’d love to have more of him on his bike. Here I am, going over the bridge on the special bike lane provided for commuters and leisure cyclists.




Another shot of me downtown, in an area known as Martin Place – a popular place for business people to go at lunchtime

Saturday, we also woke up to wet weather, but it was very windy, so the streets dried off and Tom & I went for a ride at about 10am. We went out toward Botany Bay, around the edge of the Bay and up the ocean coastline by the beaches. Here is Maroubra Beach, which is known for the “Bra Boys” who surf there.

This is the fresh market where Ellen shops. It’s located just north of the park where we cycle, so we decided to ride over and check it out. Everything looked so good – as one might expect after a 30 mile bike ride. I bought some Italian cheese and some farm tomatoes and Tom bought a passion fruit pie. The baker cautioned him to make sure he kept it level while riding home, and amazingly, Tom did a very good job of it!

By the way, the other day we saw a Campy single speed bike. Chris, (you know who you are) we imagined that you might comment that it was a waste of a perfectly good Campy frame.

Thursday (March 20) we were invited to our friends’ Walt and Ellen Hiltner’s home for prosecco, and they had prepared a delicious dinner for us. Ellen shops at a special fresh market, so we were treated to all sorts of delicacies before dinner. They are planning to re-build their home, which has the most amazing view of Sydney, and we had a chance to look at the latest revisions to their plans. They live in a heritage and conservation area, so building there is a challenging prospect. Walt and Ellen have become very special friends to us, and it’s always lots of fun to spend time with them while we’re here. We just wish that they were able to come to Seattle more often!

We’ve been told that it always rains at Easter, and sure enough, after nearly 3 weeks of spectacular weather, we woke up to wet streets and a temperature that had dropped from 82 to 66 overnight. It was the first day Tom was able to sleep in past 5:30am, as the club doesn’t usually ride in the rain.

Good Friday is a big holiday here, and nearly everything is closed. However, there are lots of fairs and many forms of entertainment at various venues around the city. We were wandering through Darling Harbour and came across a very unusual “concert”. Here’s the photo and I’ll let you draw your own conclusions.

We decided the caption for this picture should be BAD PARENTING

The Sapphire Princess dwarfs Sydney’s Circular Quay.

As Monday is a day off for the club bicycle rides, Tom takes me on a special ride each Monday. This time we went out to the southeast ocean beaches and worked our way up the coastline to Watson’s Bay, around some of the harbour beaches and then back through some very upscale neighborhoods and back to Centennial Park. All in all, it’s about a 30 mile ride with some long hills, as the roads around the coastline undulate up and down. Every time you have an easy cruise down to the beach, you know you’ll have a long climb back up. All the hills were very doable, however and we had a great ride.

We’ve taken to making many detours around neighborhoods to check out houses. This year, we’re taking lots of photographs as ideas for a possible remodel to our house. The architecture here is very creative; in fact one of the coolest houses we’ve seen is one that our architect (and cycling) friend, Jeff, is working on.

Here’s Bronte Beach at about 9:30AM

The Rock pool at Bronte beach with an impromtu waterfall feature

Famous Bondi Beach

Icebergs, a trendy restaurant and club at Bondi

The happy couple going off-road on our road bikes

Idyllic Watson’s Bay

Neilson’s beach, an inner harbour beach

Sunset under the Harbour Bridge

A perfect end to a perfect day

On Friday, our friends Jason and Kristen invited us for a visit to their home on the Central Coast. We went to visit them last year, too, and it was so memorable. When you visit the area where they live, you feel like you’ve been dropped into the most beautiful resort – there is water everywhere – bays and inlets and spectacular ocean beaches. And the whole area is carpeted with the most beautiful trees, shrubs and flowers. It is a true paradise on earth. Jason, who is a top rate chef, made us the most amazing dinner, and Kristen’s Mom & her husband joined us for the evening. Toni and Rod had taken a caravan trip around Australia this past year - they were on the road for 9 months – and it was fascinating to hear about their trip, the places they visited and the people they met. It sounded like a great adventure.

Kristen and Jason just returned from a trip to New Zealand for a friend’s wedding, and they showed us their photos and told us about the unusual celebration. The bride and groom had met in Queenstown, so that’s where they chose to wed. While the guests hiked into a lovely spot by a lake, the wedding party arrived on floating rafts, towing the bride and groom, who were riding on inflated whales. I wish I had one of their photos to post, as it was one of the most unexpected bridal processions you could imagine, and looked like incredible fun.

On Saturday morning, Jason took Tom for an epic bike ride around the area. Meanwhile, Kristen, Toni and I went shopping and out to coffee at a magical place called The Fragrant Garden. Later on we met up with the guys, and went out to the beach where Jason is a surf lifesaver and had lunch. We always have a great time with Kristen and Jason; they are beautiful, generous and fun loving people, and we treasure their friendship. We were having too much fun to take very many pictures, but here are a few.

Here is Akiko, who looks quite fierce in this photo, but she’s really a lover


And this is T-bone, who is about as sweet a cat as you’d ever meet

This is a visitor who came to check out the ladies while we had coffee

Jason, Kristen and me at the beach after lunch

P.S. If you look in the blog archives from last year you can see Jason & Kristen close up, holding T-bone.

Thursday night we attended a concert. A string orchestra from Tallinn, Estonia was visiting and the Estonian society here had arranged for them to perform in the Conservatory of Music, which is located on the edge of the Botanical Gardens. The concert was just wonderful – very talented young people, ages 12-20 – and the musical selection was superb.

Thursday (March 13) Tom was invited to go for a ride on Sydney’s north shore with a group from the Sydney Cycling Club. He left our apartment at 5:20am in order to ride through the city and over the bridge to meet them for an early morning ride. He took lots of wonderful pictures – here are just a few.

Sunrise

The group having coffee – Tom is very happy to be able to ride his bike sans winter togs

Luna Park, taken from the deck of Sydney’s Harbour Bridge

Usually, we associate Centennial Park with cycling, but as we are living so close by, we decided to take a walk through the park. There are wetlands in the middle of the park, and it is home to many different birds. Here are pelicans, ibis, gulls, black swans, some huge unidentified geese (?), wading birds and nesting black cormorants.