Holiday: Return to Oz – Day 10 (of 18): Life’s a Beach!

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THURSDAY the 28th.

6.45am: Morning Beach-Bunnies! 😀😀

Ahh! a proper night’s sleep, that’s a good start to the day!

Life’s a beach and then you fry…

(With apologies to NAZ for butchering his lyrics)

Today, we’re walking!

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We’re starting at Coogee Beach and walking via the purpose-built coastal walkway to Bondi Beach – more details HERE. Most people do it the other way round, but we do like to be different! 😁

Physically, it’s a bit of a stretch for us – we’re used to our daily 1-2 mile walks back at home, but this is a 7km hike… in the heat… up steps… down steps… up slopes… down slopes – you get the idea!

8.00am: A quick breakfast in the Apartment whilst we discussed journey options and of course, survival tactics!

8.40am: A plan hatched, it was then into the Sydney crowds (a mix of holiday-types like us, and the poor souls on the ‘9 til 5’).

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First stop will be Coogee (love that name!) town. But on this leg of the holiday, we’re sans-car, so everywhere is by taxi or (preferably) public transport.

A Bus it is then, and with our Opal Cards in our hands, it was just a five-minute walk to Elizabeth Place where we picked up the 373 Bus (the 374 would have also been an option) to get us there directly.

The journey only took around 40 minutes where the bus capacity went from being partially empty to massively over-full (requiring the Driver to SHOUT at passengers to ‘move down the Bus‘ on more than one occasion).

We overheard a passenger reflecting on his years as a Bus driver here in Sydney. “A Passenger once asked me, ‘how long is the next bus?'” With a smile on my face, I replied “It’s the same length as this Bus Madam!”

Typical Aussie humour! 🤪

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9.45 am: Still smiling, we arrived at Coogee (population 15000 +2!), where the temperature was a very pleasant 20°C with a welcome breeze – perfect walking weather then! 👍

10.01am: We’re off!  And right from the start, the views from the walkway were stunning…

There are beaches… and there are Australian Beaches! We’ve never seen such expanses of sand and they are immaculately clean too!

10.10am: More sand and sea!


10.15am:
Even more sand and sea but now with added rock formations!


10.25am:
Wow!


10.25am
Wow! Look at that sand!


10.45am:
Oh, how British Australian! A gentle game of Bowls

10.55am: This is very weird! A massive graveyard looking out to sea…

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It turned out to be Waverley Cemetary (opened in 1877) and is still in use today. It contains in excess of 50 000 graves and was an eerie sight as we came upon it.

11.05am:  An hour in, and it’s getting much (much) warmer – and the breeze of the sea is very welcome indeed! The amazing views continue…

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11.10am: A welcome pit-stop! 😁

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11.20am:
Still more sand and glorious views…

11.45am: we’re getting close to Bondi beach now, and perfectly on cue, a lone surfer

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12.15pm:  We made it! It took two-and-a-quarter hours, but we finally arrived at the famous Bondi Beach…

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12.20pm  All that walking had given us a bit of a thirst and a rumbling stomach! So we picked one of the many eateries – Trio – here that had inside seating and a breeze – the perfect conditions to reflect on our trek.

It was great food and we were so hungry, I forgot to take any photos of it!

1.05pm:  With our lunch bill paid, after a bit of guidance from our Server, we crossed the road and waited for the no. 333 that would take us straight back to within 5 minutes of our Apartment.

1.55pm:  A slightly longer journey than we thought, but we were ‘home’ and thankfully, we’d left the AC on low (as by now it was around 27°C outside, but luckily, a cool 18°C inside).

We spent the rest of the day doing very little!
See you tomorrow when the feeling in my legs has returned!

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