The city, the beach and the bush

Currently I’m checking in with you guys from a train that is taking us from Bomaderry to Wollongong. How Aussie is that?? Our last two days in this country have been spectacular and totally different from each other. After spending all of Monday at David’s apartment getting rest and doing home and life maintenance, we set out with David Tuesday into the city yet again. He took us to a local Westfields for mid morning cupcakes and coffee before we made our way down to Bondi Beach. All three of us had remnants and hints of colds and the open ocean air would probably do us some good. The ocean front was gorgeous complete with miles of rocks, cliffs and spectacular vistas that you could walk along. After getting good exercise, another 1000 pictures and enjoying the hilarity that usually ensues when we get David at full throttle we had proper fish and chips on the beach. Soon after we made our way back to the city to meet up with Tegan in the hipster part of Sydney known as Newtown. For the Chicagoans reading, it most resembled a Wicker Park, everyone trying to look like they didn’t care that much when everyone knows they care too much. We played the part, looking for cheap, trendy clothes (which is nearly impossible) and snagging coffee at a bookstore. The evening commenced with a fabulous meal cooked by D and T (mostly D) before bed.

Wednesday was a wonderfully different kind of story. David had to work so Tegan took us along with her, first to her voice lesson in Oatley, then to good lookouts on our way to Wollongong where she lives, to an animal park near her parents house in Bomaderry and finally to their place. The animal park we went to was AWESOME! My best way of describing it is it’s all the things you want to see without any of the stuff you don’t. Our Australian animal checklist was pretty much kangaroos, koalas, dingos and wombats. This place had all of those plus a hilariously friendly camel, emus, crocodiles, wallabees and huge snakes and other reptiles. We got there an hour before it closed which made for hurried visiting but we also had the whole place to ourselves. The minute we entered the park, Kris literally made a running beeline to the Koala setup. Suffice it to say, they might not have shown quite as much excitement. The park also sold us pellets to feed to animals, which came in quite handy with our camel friend who was determined to eat every pellet we had and not share any with the goats and also the kangaroos which at the start, were content to enjoy us from a 40 yard distance, but after about 10 minutes of pellet trail leading were eating right out of our hands. So cool!!!!! Tegan’s parents and sister were the benchmark of hospitality. We ate great, enjoyed wine, billiards, piano playing and stories and even got in a shower under a rain nozzle (want one!!!!) before bed. After vowing to visit again in the future, we got dropped off at the train station and boarded our train back to Wollongong to meet Tegan at her work which pretty much gets you back to now. Australia is beautiful. As I type, the train is currently hugging the ocean front on our right side while the green hills and trees rise to our left. We’ll miss it when we leave but continue to look forward and be excited for the things to come. Till then, whenever that is.