Exploring the Harbour

Sunday 18th February

We took a drive around the harbour shoreline to explore the beaches today. It’s the sort of thing I wanted to do when we came on holiday to Sydney, but a fortnight only lends itself to the obviously touristy things. We did want to stop the car, but like Keanu Reeves and Sandra Bullock in the film “Speed”, we had to keep driving above 10mph otherwise Ella would wake up (that’s not quite the premise of the film, but you get the gist).

Having driven through Watson’s Bay to Camp Cove and Vaucluse, we settled at Parsley Bay, mainly because it was the only place we could get parked up. Like many beaches, Parsley Bay has a reserve area adjoining it, a kids’ playground and a kiosk where you can buy coffee and lunches. It also has a suspension bridge spanning from one side of the beach to the other, though it’s such a short space I can’t think why anyone would have bothered to build one. I’m sure that Ordnance Survey would call it a “folly”.

Ella loved the water, though she does tend to bend over and drink it, which might not be a great idea on the harbour beaches. When there’s no surf, she wades in deeper and deeper until you have to force her to get back out. We took her to Salcombe when she was 15 months old, where she drew attention to herself by wading into the estuary wearing a nappy and raincoat before blagging her way onto a surfboard. If you’ve never seen a 15 month old baby standing on a surfboard in a raincoat, you’ve really missed out.

This evening we booked our babysitter again and headed down to Coogee, where we had dinner at a Brazillian Barbeque place which would have been Dr Atkins’ dream. You are given a block of wood to place on your table and you turn it greenside up for “more meat” and redside up for “stop”. We’ve been to a similar place in Thailand; the waiters come around with freshly barbequed cuts of meat. It’s a great idea, but you do tend to start twiddling your thumbs between slices of meat and then leave never wanting to see another cut of steak in your life. It’s not the sort of place you need to visit twice.

Afterwards, we went for drinks to the Coogee Bay Hotel. The place was full of Brits living the dream and trying to get into the opposite sex’ knickers. I’d heard about the place from people who had been backpacking, but hadn’t realised it was such a large-scale pick up joint. The ladies toilets had machines dispensing “Pheromone Wipes”, which “guarantee to make you irresistible to the opposite sex”. The wipes weren’t working for Keith, a short, bald gentleman from Wolverhampton, out on the town in three quarter length beach trousers and white socks, he cut a pretty tragic figure even before he opened his mouth. When he did speak, such brummie drawl spilled forth that I did a double take to check whether his accent was for real. The Birmingham accent is no more sexy on this side of the world. Somebody should have told him.