Sunday, January 24 - Playgrounds of the Aussies: Bondi Beach to Coogee

We observed a couple of things today about the Aussies. First, they are active, and second they love their food and drink!

Bondi Beach

 It seemed a little cooler this morning, and Ray and I decided we would do the Bondi Beach to Coogee walk along the eastern coast of the Sydney suburbs (around 6k). Jim said he would come with us, so we set off around noon, caught the 506 bus right outside the door, changed in the City to another bus, 380, destined for Bondi Beach and started our walk around 1:30. I am sure you have all heard of Bondi Beach. It is one of the world’s well known beaches, right up there with Ipanima, and Copacabana in Rio, and Chowpatty Beach in Mumbai.  The walk was busy….lots of runners, walkers, dogs, and children. The path was good and varied in difficulty, sometimes steep steps, sometimes steep path, sometimes flat. 

We came across some “painted stairs” similar to the ones we saw in San Francisco, but much older and therefore not quite as spectacular. We passed through other eastern beaches suburbs Tamarama, Bronte Beach, Clovelly Beach, Gordon’s Bay, and Coogee. We wandered around the cliff top Waverley Cemetery at Bronte looking for Sue’s Dad’s grave, to no luck! But the view from the cemetery was spectacular: it looked out over the wide open Pacific Ocean to Chile and must be one of Sydney’s most expensive real estate.

The views from the walk are outstanding: beautiful beaches, full and active oceans and beautiful rocks pounded by the ocean into amazing shapes; various birds serenaded us with song, and pretty flowers grew up alongside the path. All along the walk we noticed various activities going on: swimming in ocean pools, sand volley ball, surfing, lawn bowling at the Clovelly Beach lawn bowling club, cricket at Coogee Beach, and the most interesting to me the work out stations along the way including a spectacular outdoor gym at Clovelly Beach - what a neat idea! And, of course, Jim and I had to try them out!! In addition to all the physical activity going on, we also noticed groups of people enjoying a picnic and a beer or wine; and the restaurants and bars in the little towns were packed to over flowing with mainly 25 – 40 year olds, but of course all ages were well represented!! Everything felt so alive and vibrant!!

When we arrived at Coogee beach we noticed that there was no one in the water. Then we wondered what the helicopter was doing over the ocean close to shore. Then Jim said there must be a shark alert, and sure enough we heard the loud speaker announce it. It was quite exciting watching the little life saving dinghies charging back and forth in the bay, and eventually a larger life saving boat with flashing lights arrived on the scene, and all the time the helicopter was actively chasing shadows I assume across the bay. This continued for probably half an hour, then the helicopter lost interest and disappeared and shortly after that the coast guard announced that they believed the shark was no longer in the bay, but entering the water was at your own peril!!

It was close to 7 p.m. by the time Suzie picked us up from the bus in Balmain. She had been busy: we had a delicious dinner of barbecued chicken and salad. Soon…..well around midnight….we made it to bed ….and slept….with the memories of the day’s walk filling our minds.