Journey

Sydney 2020

22 – 26 Jan 2020 · Australia · 2 stops

Day 1 · Stop 1 of 2

Helensburgh

Loved this place. About three hours and we had seen the whole park.

Cockatoos were sitting on the picnic tables before we had properly got through the gate. Kangaroos asleep in the shade, wallabies come right up and eat out of your hand. There is a cheetah as well, and cotton-top tamarins, and echidnas including a pale one sharing with a normal dark one.

Best bit by a mile was getting to hold a Tasmanian devil. Wrapped up in a fleece blanket, wide awake, looking straight up at me and completely unbothered by any of it. I did not expect to be allowed anywhere near one.

Under an hour south of the city. Give it a whole morning at least.

From Symbio Wildlife Park

Days 1-4 · Stop 2 of 2

Sydney

Four days in Sydney with one day out of it, and I ended up seeing the city in pieces rather than all at once.

The ANZAC Memorial in Hyde Park on the first evening, which I had not planned to stop at and then stood in front of for a while - a stepped block of pale stone at the end of a long still pool, with the towers going straight up behind it. Coogee on a grey afternoon that the water did not care about. Central Station at half past midnight, lit orange with nobody in front of it and a taxi going past. And on the last morning the Opera House from the other side of the harbour at Milsons Point, which is a better view of it than the one you get standing next to it.

Out over the Tasman at sunset on the way home.