The Chinese Garden

We've been trying to lie low these past couple of weeks because the months are flying by and we've been looking at what we're gonna do when we quit working and hit the road next year. We did make it out to the Factory Theatre last weekend to see a comedian called Mark Watson. Welsh by accent but apparently he was born in Bristol. Who knows? Anyway he was awesome, incredibly funny and a nice guy too; he chatted to us afterwards about mad Aussies and the England Australia match on that evening.

Back to the almost present. We got up obscenely early for a Saturday morning to be picked up by our tour to the Hunter Valley. We arrived at the YHA by Central Station at 7:40am and hung around for 20 minutes without a sniff of the Kangaroo Bus. We called up the tour company's office and were informed that they had no booking for us for that day. It was a bit of a shock like and not a little disappointing but the nice man bribed us with the promise of a bottle of wine and told us he'd pick us up tomorrow so we took it on the chin and headed off into the city at 8am. Little did we know this would turn out to be a blessing in surprise for a few reasons - chief among them was that we got to go to The Reptile Park which wasn't included in our tour but more on that later.

So what to do in the big city at 8 o'clock on a Sunday? Got a coffee at McCafe (formerly known as McDonalds) cause we heard their coffee's meant to be good. It was ok but they lost points cause it took them 10 minutes of trying to make a cafe latte before they gave up and pawned us off with a flat white.

We mucked around Darling Harbour for a while waiting for The Chinese Garden to open, saw people meditating, got a go on the slide and had a look at some boring cars outside the Australian International Motor Show. It was dead nice because it was relatively peaceful without hordes of children and fat people running around.

On to the Chinese Garden: we thought it would be like Mr Miyagis back yard but there was more to it than that. Waterfalls and big rocks and massive fish and lovely hangy down leaved trees were abundant. We spent an hour just beating about. So quiet and relaxing and pretty, a little bit of some Chinese movie right in the heart of Sydney. We loved it.

We'd achieved more than in most average weekends and it was only 10.30! We wandered round nearby Paddy's Market which is like the indoor market in Derry but huuuuuuuggggge! They sell everything that you don't need but we managed to snag a rather useful backpack for 10 bucks.

That afternoon we got some constructive domestic stuff done, cleaned up a bit, headed to the shopping centre for some meat and stopped in the park to play frisbee on the way. Magic!

That evening was spent eating burritos, drinking wine and watching Withnail and I. Perfect day.


Saturday Bliss at Darling Harbour