Another Visit to the Lucky Land

Why are the Australians so lucky? Is it the beautiful beaches? The sensible gun laws? The growing environmental awareness that is encouraging the banning of plastic bags, straws and other crap so prevalent in the United States?

No, they are probably lucky because they do not have an orange skinned idiot as their president. We in the states can only dream of a society that has universal mandatory voting and other reforms that might prevent a fascist takeover in the future. But this is a travel blog and not a political argument, so on to business.

We arrived in Sydney on Wednesday morning and immediately used a combination of public transport options to get to our rental house. Our friends, Ronald and Jane met up with us on the first night and we had dinner at the Colloroy Beach Club; a delicious crab and prawn pasta dish for me and tumeric coconut prawns for Jayne.

A wedding party was right behind our table and we gave brief thought to stealing some of their wedding cake, but Jayne resisted temptation and ordered from the menu.

On Thursday we went for a five mile hike around Narrabeen Lake. It is a beautiful walking path that crosses two lagoons by means of brand new pedestrian bridges. It was a great experience, even though it probably contributed to the blisters I have today. We were joined by two librarians from Mosman, one of whom (another Jane) thanked me for my regular contributions to their website, Mosman Readers! Friday we went to the Vaucluse House, a historic property on the South Head of Port Jackson. Home of the man who first blazed the trail over the Blue Mountains, the place is decorated with period furniture and the grounds are beautiful.

The kitchen garden was particularly beautiful with lots of veggies growing happily in the Australian mid-winter. It does not get cold here, really. After the house tour we went to the Gap to look out on the harbor and the Pacific, and then took lunch at the fishmongers at Watson's Bay.

The State Library of New South Wales has a small collection of Sydney-published Wyatt Earp comic books that I must examine, but that will have to wait until after we go to the library conference in Queensland next Monday. As for today (Saturday) we are off to the Opera House to hear a concert of Beatles music from the White Album. I think hearing "Rocky Racoon" sung by an Aussie ought to be interesting!