Curl Curl Beach

Move in day is tomorrow!!

But this past week, we stayed at one more airbnb to check out another Northern beach called Curl Curl.  You would think it's named this because of the curls of the waves that make this one of the best surfing beaches, but it's actually derived from a variation of the original Aboriginal name.  Say that 5 times fast...original Aboriginal...

Two things I learned about surfing so far:

1.  Surfers will leave their keys in the wheel well of their car when they go surfing

2.  Other, smarter surfers will actually have a combination lock box attached to the door handle of their car.  Maybe he was a realtor and had extra lock boxes.  This is a great idea for runners/hikers that don't want to carry the extra weight of their car key on them.

The weather this past week hasn't been great.  It's been raining most days and I left our one umbrella on the ferry last night. Ugh!  But at least Monday cleared up enough so that I could do some exploring and yoga on a cliffside.

There's a loose leash dog area at the north end of Curl Curl beach where dogs can frolic in the lagoon.

North of Curl Curl beach is a nature walk trail that takes you into a headland which you can follow down to the ocean pool.  I didn't realize there were so many ocean pools in Australia.  I don't think this is a thing in the states.  I stopped on a landing overlooking the pool to get my Om on.  You can definitely feel one with everything here.

I hiked on up the headland and took a few more pictures and a video!

Of course I'm missing Arizona.  I get small reminders of it sometimes.  Like the lantana grows everywhere here and I see this bird that reminds me of the quail that run around my neighborhood.  It's actually called a crested pigeon.

Chippendale, New South Wales

It's been a record 3 weeks living in a hotel room in Sydney.  The streak ends this weekend when we move into an Airbnb in Manly.  Our apartment actually won't be ready until mid October.

Although living in a hotel for this long is not ideal, there will be a few things I'll miss in this suburb they call Chippendale.  Chippendale is right in the middle of Sydney.  In fact, the closest train station is Central Station.  Because of that, it's easy to get anywhere from here.  We can walk to Darling Harbor, China Town, or the Haymarket.  Today's going to be sunny, so I'm walking out to Hyde Park to do some jogging.  Chippendale is the perfect location for us to explore the different neighborhoods we wanted to learn more about.

It is definitely a big city, hustle and bustle feel here.  So, I'll be glad to leave this for the suburbs.  Our hotel is right across the street from the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) and  the University of Notre Dame.  The University of Sydney and Charles Darwin University are close by as well.  It's  a very busy area.  I compare the walk to Central Station like walking in NYC, except with British Commonwealth rules which means we walk on the left and pass on the right.  This is also important to remember this when you're on the escalator.

This area has seen some revitalization after the completion of the Central Park project which boasts a beautiful park and eco-sustainable buildings fueled by it's own power generator housed in the old brewery.  I have a view of the brewery from my window.

If you look behind the smokestack on the left, you'll see one of the mixed-use buildings practically covered in plants.  The building is a vertical garden.  The story of it can be found here.  When it's time to water the plants, you do get a few sprinkles as you're walking by the buildings on your way to Central Station.

Another cool thing about this neighborhood is the restaurants.  This is a definite plus if you're living in a hotel without a kitchen.  Central Park Mall takes up the first few stories of the vertical garden buildings.  The Mall has many restaurants outside in a beautiful courtyard, or you can grab something from the food court and enjoy eating on the balcony overlooking the park.  Also, on the East side of the mall is Kensington Street with even more eateries.  Every Saturday this month, they had the Kensington Street Festival which featured artists, DJs and bands.

Also within Kensington Street is Spice Alley.  If you blink you'll miss the entrance.  Within that alley are more than a dozen Asian restaurants including food from Malaysia, Thailand, Taiwan, even Hainanese, which sounds like my kind of food! It's like a Singaporean Hawkers Market with every possible variety of curry, dumpling, noodle and satay skewer you can think of.

Knowing I won't be here much longer, I splurged on dessert yesterday and picked up an Ice Kacang.

I only read about the Ice Kacang from Crazy Rich Asians.  As described in the book, it reminded me of the Filipino dessert Halo-Halo with the ice, gelatin and sweet red beans.  However, I have to say, it didn't hit the mark.  The crispy rice, ube and jack fruit were missing from the Ice Kacang.  So Halo-Halo is still my all time favorite.

Yes, the restaurant is called Happy Endings (insert eye-roll here).  This weekend marks the happy ending of my life in the big city.  Next week, we'll see what beach suburb life has in store.