| july 2004 news |
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| update 18 july 2004 |
| hope you are enjoying the summer back home - wimbledon, strawberries, the grand prix..... yes we have seen the weather reports. we're hoping that it warms up for our return. don't worry, it's a similar temperature over here: a 'chilly' 18 degs and clear blue skies most days. we are constantly wearing scarf and gloves which seems very strange. as ever, this past month seems to have flown by. seems like we have been in sydney for ages but it is only really 6 weeks. thankfully we both have managed to find work: simon is at pwc whilst alison is in an accounts office. so glad that 'bean counting' is not our chosen professions back in the uk. in between working you'll be pleased to know we have been doing our best to enjoy the delights of sydney. we started out with a totally blow-out meal for our wedding anniversary overlooking the harbour bridge and the opera house (www.waterfrontrestaurant.com.au). very nice, far too much to eat and fantastic value. there is no way we would have been able to have a meal like that in the centre of london for 100GBP. actually eating and drinking does seem to have been the theme for sydney. we spent a very pleasant sunday afternoon wandering round manly for their food and wine festival. everyone just eating lots of great cheap food and tasting lots of great australian wine. we've also managed to go and have fish and chips at the famous doyles at watsons bay. great fish and with superb views of the cbd - definately why you move to sydney. we live in glebe which is full of great little cheap cafes and restaurants: lots of temptation and all the flavours of world on our doorstep it seems. it has been strange as well to catch up with some of our melbourne friends - nick c, rachel, coutts and ben from the groovy grape tour. true to form, all seem to have involved good food, good wine and good conversation. don't worry we have managed to get out of the city: we had a fantastic day in the blue mountains, 2 hours out of sydney. spectacular views and a great 3 hour walk through the grand canyon. the final 30 mins was definately a bit of a killer. and this weekend we have just returned from a day trip to the hunter valley - although, again, lots of food and wine! doh! our favourite winery has been iron gate, where we were shown round by the winemaker and were able to drink straight from the fermentation tanks. fantastic. our friends at tnt magazine also gave us another free night out. this time we headed to the now world famous slip inn. this is where the australian, mary donaldson, met the danish crown prince. you may have seen that they recently got married which was major event here. unbelievably, we only have about 8 days left in australia before we head onto new zealand. can not believe that we are nearly at the end of our time here. sydney is definitely different to melbourne, and despite the better climate, we would still chose melbourne over sydney. it's very hard to describe - although sydney has all the big sights, there's a lot more to melbourne. it's less superfical, far fewer backpackers and has and a lot more going on. as ever, photos are on the website: thankfully we still have our photos. a 'slight technical hitch' at the website company meant that for about 3 days all photos from leaving melbourne to sydney had been lost! needless to say, we were not happy but all is well now. a big thanks go out to chris and tim who came to our rescue. so, new zealand here we come! |
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