I am currently going through my third Sydney winter. With this vast experience behind me, I can now share with you some extensive research I have conducted into Sydney winters. I have learnt the following things:
- No matter how old or new, rickety or solid your house is, during winter, the inside temperature will maintain a constant 10 degrees colder than the outside temperature.
- This is due to the Australian insistence that insulation is on the whole unnecessary.
- This in turn means that, no matter how old or new, rickety or solid your house is, you will constantly find patches of mould on your walls.
- To combat this, the advice is to ventilate your rooms thoroughly, everyday. This lowers even further the indoor temperature of your house.
- The disparity between indoor and outdoor temperature may trick you into putting on 64782 layers before you leave the house. Don't. You will be sweating within minutes.
- No matter how hot I am hurrying around with one too many layers on, I still see plenty of Sydneysiders all bundled up in hats, scarves and big padded coats as though they were off for a polar expedition.
- To cope with indoor temperatures, I have established from talking to Australians that it is normal to have an array of thick winter houseclothes, far more than you would ever need outside.
- As well as the above, it is normal to have a duvet on your sofa during winter, to sit under when you are watching tv, reading, or other sofa-based activities. I went in for this this winter and it's lovable!
Wednesday 21 July 2010
Monday 19 July 2010
In which the sky is blue and the Opera House gleams
Opera House in mid-winter......
Sunday was the most beautiful, sunny warm day. I took the train to Circular Quay and walked up to the Opera House, out of boredom more than anything. There were so many people. Opera Bar was heaving and they had live music outside.
The sails look so smooth from a distance. It always surprises me to see the mosaic effect close up.
The city gleams. I took a very similar photo back on the first day I arrived in Sydney.
From the Opera House, I walked back round Circular Quay and into the Rocks, stopping at that little cafe for a Florentine (my favourite ever biscuit). Wandered further on up George Street suffering a severe coffee craving and trying to find a flat white that wasn't $4.50 ($3.50 is really my upper limit when paying for coffee) but failed. Sat around Susannah Place for a little while, then gandered back down George Street all the way to St James for the train home.
Tonight I am working uggh. Although it is less painful when at home on the sofa with a cup of tea and the tv on. I'm out of the office on a management course for the next couple of days, so it's going to be very busy trying to catch up. Mark is back home first thing in the morning, so hopefully I'll see him before I go to work!
Sunday 18 July 2010
In which Luna Park is very enjoyable.
Mark has been away this week, on a fleeting visit (really fleeting - less than a week between arrival and departure!) back to the UK for a job interview. But more on that another time.
With Mark away, my last week passed rather quietly, but not unpleasantly. Friday however was an exciting day. Dean (my boss) took Sharon (the other team leader in our unit) and I out for a lovely lunch at Grasshopper, a little restaurant and bar just down from our office on Temperance Lane (off George Street - you can't actually see it from George Street and I always thought the lane was just a place where bins were kept, it was surprising to see a restaurant at the end of it!). It was a great meal. I had Sydney Rock oysters to start followed by Kingfish with aioli. Delicious!! Dean had a scotch quail's egg for his starter which looked like the greatest thing ever. It's a cool little restaurant, and the bar downstairs looked good too, although I imagine considering its location right in the city, it probably gets a little 'businessy' most nights.
After work was Aisling and Louise's leaving party (they are off back to Ireland), for which they came up with the ingenious idea of a trip to Luna Park, Sydney's famous, historic amusement park.
We caught the train to Milson's Point, just the other side of the Harbour Bridge, and trundled our way downhill until the lights of the great big Luna Park Face stood before us!
The entry is through the mouth! On Friday you can get an unlimited pass for all rides for $35, so with wristbands installed on our wrists, off we went. First up was the Tango Train, a music express ride that spun you round and round and up and down. Then, Mark, Geaspar and May went on the Rotor, while the rest of us sensibly watched from the viewing platform at the top. The Rotor is like a human-sized salad spinner - it starts spinning and then they take the floor away and you stick to the wall because of the centrifugal force! It made us feel dizzy watching it. Then, Aisling and I squeezed into a car on the Wild Mouse rollercoaster, which is a real olden days style rickety wooden roller coaster and is actually terrifying because it is right on the edge of the harbour and tricks you into thinking you are going to fall into the water!
Then we rode the swings which made us cold as we breezed through the night air, then Mark, Daniella, May, Geaspar and I went off to ride the Dodgems while everyone else went for the Waltzer. The dodgems were my favourite I think - it was amazing fun!!!
A lot of candy floss later and Daniella and I went to ride the Carousel whilst everyone else went on something more spinny and less charming.
The Carousel is a genuine 19th Century carousel and is beautiful! It plays music from an organ dating from 1904, all tinkly.
I rode a horse, Daniella rode a cockerel. Finally, we rode the ferris wheel, which, with this view over Sydney Harbour, is pretty much worth the entry price alone:
Then it was almost 11pm and time for the park to close and us all to go home to our beds, not least because it was a very chilly night and we had been swooping around outside getting chilled for too long. But we could not leave before Mark and Geaspar went on the Rotor again because they are INSANE. I'll have to go back to take Mark on the ferris wheel. I did have a surprising amount of fun at Luna Park - there are enough rides to please pretty much anyone, and there was a good mix of people there, not just big groups of irritating teenagers like you would get at british funfairs.
With Mark away, my last week passed rather quietly, but not unpleasantly. Friday however was an exciting day. Dean (my boss) took Sharon (the other team leader in our unit) and I out for a lovely lunch at Grasshopper, a little restaurant and bar just down from our office on Temperance Lane (off George Street - you can't actually see it from George Street and I always thought the lane was just a place where bins were kept, it was surprising to see a restaurant at the end of it!). It was a great meal. I had Sydney Rock oysters to start followed by Kingfish with aioli. Delicious!! Dean had a scotch quail's egg for his starter which looked like the greatest thing ever. It's a cool little restaurant, and the bar downstairs looked good too, although I imagine considering its location right in the city, it probably gets a little 'businessy' most nights.
After work was Aisling and Louise's leaving party (they are off back to Ireland), for which they came up with the ingenious idea of a trip to Luna Park, Sydney's famous, historic amusement park.
We caught the train to Milson's Point, just the other side of the Harbour Bridge, and trundled our way downhill until the lights of the great big Luna Park Face stood before us!
The entry is through the mouth! On Friday you can get an unlimited pass for all rides for $35, so with wristbands installed on our wrists, off we went. First up was the Tango Train, a music express ride that spun you round and round and up and down. Then, Mark, Geaspar and May went on the Rotor, while the rest of us sensibly watched from the viewing platform at the top. The Rotor is like a human-sized salad spinner - it starts spinning and then they take the floor away and you stick to the wall because of the centrifugal force! It made us feel dizzy watching it. Then, Aisling and I squeezed into a car on the Wild Mouse rollercoaster, which is a real olden days style rickety wooden roller coaster and is actually terrifying because it is right on the edge of the harbour and tricks you into thinking you are going to fall into the water!
Then we rode the swings which made us cold as we breezed through the night air, then Mark, Daniella, May, Geaspar and I went off to ride the Dodgems while everyone else went for the Waltzer. The dodgems were my favourite I think - it was amazing fun!!!
A lot of candy floss later and Daniella and I went to ride the Carousel whilst everyone else went on something more spinny and less charming.
The Carousel is a genuine 19th Century carousel and is beautiful! It plays music from an organ dating from 1904, all tinkly.
I rode a horse, Daniella rode a cockerel. Finally, we rode the ferris wheel, which, with this view over Sydney Harbour, is pretty much worth the entry price alone:
Then it was almost 11pm and time for the park to close and us all to go home to our beds, not least because it was a very chilly night and we had been swooping around outside getting chilled for too long. But we could not leave before Mark and Geaspar went on the Rotor again because they are INSANE. I'll have to go back to take Mark on the ferris wheel. I did have a surprising amount of fun at Luna Park - there are enough rides to please pretty much anyone, and there was a good mix of people there, not just big groups of irritating teenagers like you would get at british funfairs.
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