Things you notice

Waking out of bed rather late in the day I crawled downstairs to beans on toast and to Simone's flatmate Isi who was feeling rather unwell. The household had been going down with something for a number of days and yet I had somehow remained well throughout this period as coughing and spluttering multiplied throughout the house.

Sydney is a fascinating city to visit. Like many major international cities such as London and New York, the city has a cosmopolitan and sophisticated atmosphere to it. Yet the city also manages to have extremely laid back and relaxing suburbs such as Manly and Bondi where shorts rule and anyone wearing a suit may as well be an alien! Having lived here now for nearly two weeks I would seriously consider settling down in Sydney for a while as it does seem to be an extremely livable city where people are not afraid to work hard and play even harder in their spare time. I guess its a liveable place like London is but unlike London one does not need to be rich or well off to be able to enjoy yourself as much.

Sydney as a city is centred on the harbour. The city sprawls around the harbour and simply would not exist if the harbour wasn't there. Hence river transport is absolutely essential and very much epitomises the ethos and nature of the city. By all accounts one of the best ferry rides you can take in the city is the ferry to Manly which is about a 15 minute trip costing about $12 for just the ride itself. Although the weather was looking somewhat cloudy and uncertain I decided to pay the $15 daytripper cost and jumped on the train in Newtown heading for the city.

Trains in the US, sorry I mean Sydney!!!
Now one thing interesting about trains in Sydney is that they are remarkably similar in design to the Amtrak trains in the US and some DB trains in Germany. Every carriage has two levels with seats that you can pull back according to the direction you are travelling in. Isn't it weird that something can be so similar in three countries which would otherwise be considered very different in every other way. I could not help but wonder who actually builds these trains and where do they come from as they must do a very good trade!

Manly Ferry
The main ferry terminal is located at Circular Quay, which is a stones throw away from the Opera House. The 8 or so docks provide regular ferry's to many points on the harbour and the surrounding areas. Many residents of the city use the river transport as a means to get to and from work on a daily basis and its really not hard to see why. Unlike roads the rivers do not suffer from congestion and seem to leave and arrive on time. Added together with the low amount of pollution the boats probably produce compared to cars and you have a very convincing argument for this form of public transport.

Boarding the ferry at bay 3 I headed across the harbour towards Manly. Sydney harbour is one of the most stunning natural habours in the world. The city sprawls around the natural conturs of the city, with the CBD strangly spreading across the iconic bridge onto the northside of the harbour. When I first arrived in the city many years ago I was fascinated by this fact as every CBD that I had studied was located in one central place. Here was a city which had a CBD seemingly on each side of the bridge!

Of course the Opera House stands out in the habour because of its dynamic design. Interestingly enough it was considered a bit of a failure at first, taking some 11 years or so to build, whilst also going far over budget. Now it is considered a modern wonder of the world for its unique design and setting. With Governments across the world taking less and less involvement in even important social development and infrastructure projects you cannot help but wonder whether a Government now-a-days would be prepared to build such a monumentous building.

Manly
Manly is located in the north of the city and is usually reached by the ferry which goes there directly from Circular Quay. The more cities I travel to the more I seem to find parallels with places back in the UK as if there is some grand design to things! Manly is yet another place which reminds me of Brighton!!! Seaquils fly around the harbour whilst fish and chip shops and cheap taggy souvenir shops seem most widespread. The boat comes into the south of Manly with the beach a short walk to the north through the main prominade. The beach was extremely busy with topless girls sunbathing next to kids building sand castles like I used to when I was a kid back home.

What made the setting different was the poles by the side of the beach. Curious as to what they are I asked a young life-guard who was setting about a metre away from me. 'Well the yellow and red flags mean you can swim inside them' he told me. 'Ok so what are the blue flags outside them?' I asked, 'oh they indicate to the surfers that they are not allowed in between'. Five minutes later a message went out on the tanner notifying people that blue-nosed jellyfish were in the sea and they should come closer to the beach.

Asking my new guide, I mean life guard, about this he told me as a matter of fact that 'they can leave very painful marks on you and can be deadly'! With this comment made I decided I wouldn't go to the bother of swimming! I guess in the UK nothing can eat or kill you if you go swimming!