Steak 'n' Sydney

After our four weeks we came to realise why there’s so many travel and flight shops in New Zealand, it’s because everyone wants out and the ones who can’t get a flight are left with no option but to throw themselves off or out of bridges, gorges, mountains, planes or anything they can think of to relieve the mind numbing boredom of life with the Kiwi’s. So as we waited for our flight to Sydney we hoped that Australia was going to be a whole lot better and not more of the same.

On arriving in Sydney we got on a shuttle train into the city to meet our friend Elizabeth who we staying with for our first few days in Oz. Elizabeth used to work with a friend of mine and we got to know each other when she would meet us in Rab Ha’s or Bacchus before and after going to Celtic games. She surprised us a few years back when she took a career break and went to Portugal to work in a bar, we didn’t think she could survive being away from Celtic and Henrik Larsson. She didn’t last long on her return and was soon on her way to Oz where she has been for the last two years.

After meeting Elizabeth we got ourselves a weekly train, bus and ferry pass for AU$32 (about £13 UK) and headed out to Neutral Bay on the north side of Sydney Harbour, crossing the famous landmark Sydney Harbour bridge for the first of about 100 times. It was only about 10 minutes on the bus to Elizabeth’s house where we quickly dumped our bags had a cup of tea before heading back into the city for some dinner and our first look around.

We went to Darling Harbour which has a plethora of fancy bars and restaurants, overlooking yachts bobbing up and down on the quayside, and had our first great meal in Australia while catching up with all Elizabeth’s news. Everyone knows Joanne can talk for Scotland but she had found her match in Elizabeth and with me being so quiet it was really hard to get a word in edgeways. We then wandered down to circular quay and had our first look at the Opera House which seemed quite surreal after seeing it so many time on television and in books. It truly is a spectacular setting with the Harbour Bridge and the skyscrapers sparkling incandescently behind the Opera House in the night sky.


After a wander round the historic Rocks area (well as historic as Australia gets) with it’s Victorian warehouses which now house fancy designer stores & over-priced coffee shops, I’m not sure what the first load of convicts who landed here would have thought of the Chai Tea Latte’s, Louis Vitton handbags and Versace vests in the newly gentrified Rocks.


We then went for a drink in a large bar which also like most bars in New Zealand had half the place taken over by slot machines or as there more commonly known around these parts as Pokies. Not just your one or two in the corner like back home but 20 to 30 with all the associated noises and hangers on like you would expect, so much for a quiet drink. In the other corner a band from New Zealand were playing middle of the road rock music a bit like Bryan Adams which seemed to go down well with the locals as they danced and shouted along with every word. After our drink we headed back to Neutral Bay by ferry across the harbour with the Opera House to our right and the Harbour Bridge on the left it wasn‘t long before we were back in Elizabeth’s.

Elizabeth had taken the Friday & Monday off so that she could show us Sydney’s hotspots and some of the places that the guide-books forget to tell you about. First off we had to go into the CBD (Central Business District) to go into Trailfinders and get some forms for our Chinese Visa application and some info on Japan’s Bullet trains which we have to book before entering the country. Once we got the admin stuff out the way we headed down to the Opera House for a daytime look around the harbour and the place looked just as spectacular as the night before but this time it was the sun that was sparkling on the turquoise waters of the bay and the shimmering tiles of the Opera House.


We then strolled through the Botanic Gardens with it’s ornamental ponds and decorative pathways which are inhabited by strange looking birds that I hadn’t come across before called Ibis they have strange curved beaks which seemed to have been specially designed to get into the bottom of McDonald’s french fry wrappers. We then passed by some trees when Elizabeth pointed out thousands of bats hanging upside down on the highest branches above our heads, every now and again a bat would fly off and you'd see it’s unmistakable wings in the blue sky.


For lunch we headed into China Town for Yum Cha, to be honest I’m not sure what the difference between Dim Sum and Yum Cha is but I wasn’t complaining. After being seated in the huge over-ornate dining area and loaded up on Green Tea, an endless procession of small oriental woman in large trainers would shuffle past us pushing steaming carts of food. Every now and then they would stop at our table and indecipherably shout high pitched at us before lifting the lids to dumplings, spring rolls and other riches and would motion them towards our plates. If there advances weren’t knocked back quickly enough it was straight on to our table and our bingo ticket like bill was stamped in the corresponding square and within seconds they were off to harangue the next table. The food was amazing with each parcel or spring-roll crammed with chicken, prawn or beef and bursting with flavours of ginger, spinach and garlic.


Next off it was down to Circular Quay for the Manly Ferry, this is nothing to do with the rest of the Ferry’s being overtly feminine but just the name of the final destination on this route. We disembarked at the picturesque beach of Manly and wandered about watching people fall off surf boards, more people fall off surf boards and very occasionally someone staying on one for over 10 seconds. The beach was a beautiful golden colour and was quite busy for an early Spring Friday afternoon. This is when Elizabeth told us what’s her prerequisites for Australian men….

1) Bluies (Tight Blue Shorts)
2) Flannel Shirt
3) Wife Beater (Vest)
4) Yoout with a dog in the back (Jeep with a flatbed)

And finally

5) White Speedos for the beach (as modelled by George Michael in the Club Tropicana video)


I had heard of Elizabeth’s unhealthy obsession for George Michael in the past and her pilgrimage to Wembley in the mid 80’s to see Wham’s final gig before the other one disappeared into the sunset and before George disappeared into a Los Angeles public toilet. Elizabeth has a total collection of about 28 CD’s 25 of which are by Mr Michael, her father once remarked that if George recorded “The Sash” she would probably still buy it.

After all our exertions of watching the surfers we decided to head to Cold Rock Ices for some ice cream, it wasn’t just your vanilla here. For about £2 you got two massive slabs of ice cream from a choice of about 50 different types and then you had the choice of a filling to be mashed into the combination of ice creams. Here’s the choices we went for with Joanne's combination being the best of the three (she certainly knows her ice cream)

Chris: Pistachio & Almond Ice Creams with Cookie Dough
Joanne: Milk Chocolate & Peanut Butter Ice Creams with Peppermint Aero
Elizabeth: Vanilla & Strawberry Ice Creams with Jaffa Bursts


After we washed down our indulgences with some coffee’s we watched the sun slowly set on the beach before heading back to Elizabeth’s on the bus. That night we went for dinner in a small Japanese restaurant in Neutral Bay called Koh-Ya BBQ with Elizabeth’s friend from work Nick and his partner Matt. In Sydney most restaurant’s have a BYO (Bring Your Own) policy which allows you to bring your own wine for a small corkage fee, it’s also about £2 or £3 cheaper for a good bottle of wine from an off sales here than back home.

It was a buffet style restaurant with a slight twist, once you select you meat & vegetables it’s brought to your table raw and you cook the food yourself in a small gas grill sunk in the centre of the tables. This turned out to be great, the quality of the food was brilliant and we managed without anybody getting burned or getting food poisoning. After the meal we went to a local bar called “The Oaks”, Matt was struggling as the night wore on, more and more to understand the three Scots as we talked to Nick a Londoner about things from Britain. At about 1:30 we called it a night and said goodbye to Nick & Matt who live on the side of the Harbour.

Saturday morning we headed over to Paddington to have a browse round the weekend market, Joanne bought a pair of sunglasses at the second stall we saw and hexed the rest of the weekend as the sun was never seen again. The market was definitely a whole lot better than the Barras in Glasgow with original & quality merchandise on nearly every stall and no Pirate DVD’s or cheap tobacco in sight. We then stumbled on a stall selling rubber masks when the owner asked me to try one on, he must of thought my striking good looks would boost his sales. Our favourite was the balding condescending looking mask with a large hooked nose called “Vinny”, somehow it seemed strangely familiar.



After the three of us devoured our steak sandwiches for lunch we wandered round the rest of the market, there’s loads of good artwork and photographic prints on sale. I also got a Dubcentral t-shirt made up from a stall called Global Style who made up t-shirts to your design in about 15 minutes.

Next stop on our Sydney tour was Bondi Beach, which to be honest was rather disappointing with grey skies due to Joanne’s Sunglasses curse and it also seemed a bit run down compared to Manly from the day before. We had a quick stroll up and down the promenade before hightailing it back to Neutral Bay and onto the net for a few hours.

Saturday night and we were meeting up with Maria and Paul more of Elizabeth’s friends in Newtown and the plan was to head for some Thai food. As we were walking along the road we could hear this blaring music coming from behind us and as we turned round we saw this souped up wheel chair speeding towards us with a guy who looked like a cross between Davros and Joey Ramone holding a large ghetto blaster on his knees swerving in and out of all the pedestrians scrambling out of his way. All I could think of was the ram-raiding granny in the Irn Bru advert and the tag line “Step away from the Vehicle”, Newtown definitely had it‘s fair share of characters. We soon realised that Newtown had about 100 Thai restaurants and most were full but we managed to get a table for 5 after not to long.


We ordered 5 mains and a few side plates and every single dish was delicious, by the end there wasn’t a single piece of food left on any of the plates. I spent most of the night talking to Paul about travelling and IT stuff as he does some similar work as I did back home. We rounded off a good night with some coffee’s and headed back for the evening to watch some football on the TV. Sunday we had a lazy day as Joanne’s Sunglasses spell was not for letting up so we caught up with some blogger stuff and sat and read the Sunday papers.

Monday morning and it was still quite grey so we headed down to some bookshops in Mosman just along the road from Neutral Bay and once the sun came out we wandered down to the beach. There was a large shark net across the beach that looked rather worse for wear and didn’t look if it would dissuade a goldfish never mind a Great White from getting close to the beach. Once again the beach looked really good and put Bondi to shame, I’m not sure why Bondi is so famous but all these other beaches we have seen seem so much better. We then had a late lunch which again was terrific, Sydney seems to be rivalling Texas for all the great food, we haven’t had a bad meal yet.

That night Elizabeth had a ticket for the Premiere of Cate Blanchett's new movie “Little Fish”, so Joanne and I went up to Kings Cross for a wander about and to book some things on the internet. After taking some photos at the large Coca Cola sign at the top of William Street we got the metro back down to Circular Quay and took some more night photos of the Opera House and The Harbour Bridge.

It was also our 4th Wedding Anniversary so we decided to treat ourselves (I know you are all laughing back home, if talking a year off work is not enough of a treat), we decided to have some cocktails in the Opera House overlooking the harbour and the bridge. It was a great spot to sit back and relax, it’s going to be difficult to top this one, last year it was Prague not sure where it will be next year. After her film was over Elizabeth came and met us for a drink and told us all about the movie, which she really enjoyed.

Elizabeth was back to work on the Tuesday morning and we had to head over to Camperdown to hand in our applications for our Chinese Visas, the office was closed but a shop across the road would process the applications for a small fee so it wasn’t a wasted journey. After that we headed back into the centre and window shopped along George Street, Sydney’s main shopping thoroughfare. Most things seemed quite reasonable and a whole lot cheaper than New Zealand, we even picked up some really cheap DVD’s in JB -Hifi a cross between Fopp and Richer Sounds back home.

We got the bus back to Mosman to use the internet and Elizabeth met us there, so we could go for dinner in the bar just along the road which sells $5 Dollar Steak. This seems to be a bit of an institution out here in Oz, you see it advertised in big banners outside many bars and restaurants. I can’t think of anywhere back home where you would get steak for under £10 but for £2.20 we were served a massive steak covered in a really nice pepper sauce and mashed potatoes. After that we headed back to Elizabeth's so that she could watch “The Bill” and we could pack our bags for our trip down to the Snowy Mountains.