This weekend we found ourselves in Orange, visting our daughter Lauren who lives there.
Orange is absolutely beautiful in autumn, and our visit coincided with Orange Food Week.
We did a number of “P” things…
A spot of wine tasting at Philip Shaw’s winery
A spot of wine tasting at Philip Shaw’s winery
Bought some Pink Lady apples at the markets in Cook Park
And had a Pie at Pie in the Sky at Bilpin on the way home
A great weekend 🙂
Damn! NEXT weekend we are going to Orange.
Orange Grove Public School in the heart of Lilyfield, has fabulous markets every Saturday morning. Every few weeks we have driven past these markets on our way to do something else, and this weekend we eventually got around to going. Beautiful fresh produce. Go there! 
Beautiful fresh flowers
Markets
Easter, and an opportunity to enjoy the company of Phil and Jill Walker, friends from Canberra and the brains behind this year’s alphabet theme.
After 2 days of solid rain, the sun came out and a chance to enjoy a lovely breakfast at Ripples Cafe at Chowder Bay before heading towards Neutral Bay to walk around Cremorne Point and show off the most beautiful kilometre this city has to offer.
Chowder Bay
Ripples Cafe at Chowder Bay
Georges Head, with the city in the background.
Georges Head, with South Head in the background.
Georges Head, with the city in the background.
Cremorne Point, such a beautiful spot so close to the Harbour Bridge and city
Cremorne Point has beautiful gardens, some established years ago by some of the local residents and maintained now by the council.
And this, just a kilometre or so from the heart of the city.
A beautiful morning after 2 solid days of rain
Lighthouse at the end of the point, looking towards the Heads
Near Cremorne Ferry Wharf
The western shore of the path, facing The Bridge
Addison Rd Marrickville, hosts weekly markets each Sunday.
Love a market with plenty of tasting plates
Delicious produce from near and far – bought some pears from Batlow
Delicious food, interesting stalls with lots of organic and vegan friendly produce.
However, I’m reminded of a Calvin and Hobbes (Waterson) cartoon.
I know “one person’s trash is another’s treasure”, but boy, there’s some crap for sale!
The Bowerbird is the trash and treasure
Yep, 2nd hand paint. Now that’ll be handy. Colour doesn’t matter anyway!
Saturday afternoon we headed out to Lavender Bay, near North Sydney, to walk from there around the foreshore to Luna Park. Historically typical of foreshore land being used for industry in the past couple of centuries, as recently as 2005 small ships were still being built at a boat shed there on land that is now a mixture of apartments worth millions of dollars and beautiful grass parkland (with brides at every turn!) 
We parked at Blues Point Tower (what a great spot to watch the fireworks on New Year’s Eve)
Stairs leading down to the foreshore at Lavender Bay
Boat building, baths, welding, slipways… such recent history
The path is populated with these whimsical characters/statues/caricatures.
Picnic ground out the back of Luna Park
And then a hot chocolate at the Lindt Cafe. 95 days after that December morning, thousands of people came, not to gawk I believe, but to just quietly make sure these bastards don’t win.
Wendy Whitely, Brett Whiteley’s widow, has a garden down that way… might file that idea away for W
Image: metaljar
Don’t think we have EVER given an 11/10 for breakie before… and if our coffees came a little bit sooner, it would have been.
So 9/10
WOW! We both had the Arabian Eggs (from a very small menu)
They were sensational – best egg breakfast we’ve had in the past 3 years, probably.
This tiny cafe is right on the wharf at Kirribilli. Make a choice… catch a ferry or eat… decisions, decisions!
A tiny, but really interesting menu – see it here
It’s a great location, right next to Admiralty House
Robyn had a red hot crack at re-creating Arabian eggs – damn good!
Image: metaljar
Image: metaljar
Image: metaljar
Image: metaljar
Image: metaljar
Image: metaljar
Image: metaljar
A beautiful, sunny Saturday morning – a great day to do that H for Helicopter Joy Flight we put off a few weeks ago because of the weather.
John from Heliscenic at Bankstown was our pilot – friend of a friend who gave us a great rate (Thank you Di Lewis!!)
WHAT A BLAST! Your wedding or birth of your kids is meant to be the best 90 minutes of your life…? NOT ANY MORE!
We retraced our 2014 year of walking the beaches and harbour.
We flew from Bankstown, over Parramatta, Pennant Hills, Hornsby and the F3/M1 to Lion Island and Barrenjoey,
then down the coast to Cronuilla, back up the coast to the Heads, then
straight down Sydney Harbour, over the Harbour Bridge down to Rhodes than back to Bankstown.
Absolutely sensational!
Thanks John Rappell. 0411 234 164
Presuming no one wants to actually watch a GoPro video of the 90 odd minutes in normal time, I’ve uploaded 4x normal speed and 8x normal speed videos.
All the images uploaded to flickr
Image: metaljar
Home and Away. Image: metaljar
Well snapped, Robyn! Image: metaljar
Our favourite 3 or 4 houses from our walk last year; on the Bilgola Bends. Image: metaljar
Warriewood / Narrabeen Image: metaljar
South Head Image: metaljar
Looking over Dover Heights to the city. Image: metaljar
After a fabulous wedding where Nic and Jo said “I do” we needed to head over to Erskinville to pick up a car that was left there in The Great Clear Family Wedding Car Shuffle. We made our way there, during Sydney’s terrific first day of autumn afternoon downpour, via Enmore for some Ice cream.
There’s so many great Gelato cafes through the inner west, including a previous favourite, n2 extreme gelato  Check it out – very cool how they just add liquid nitrogen to a liquid mix and create instant ice cream. We didn’t go there, however… time for something new 🙂 Across the road from the iconic Enmore Theatre in King St is Cow and Moon, purveyors of THE BEST ICE CREAM IN SYDNEY. Yep, big claim, so check this link.
Image: metaljar
A great range of amazing flavours. $6.50 for a medium cup with 3 flavours… that’ll do! Cointreau, Hazelnut Roche, Afogato, Banana and Salted Caramel, Apple Lemon and Blood Orange Sorbet, Popcorn, Pistachio, Coconut and Hazelnut Roche, Hazelnut and Italian Nougat, Jaffa, traditional Lemon Sorbet, Mixed Berry and Chocolate Sorbet… bloody good!
Image: metaljar
We wandered along Enmore Road while we ate, and washed our sticky hands under the dripping downpipe of the Enmore.
Image: metaljar
So, on to J… no real thoughts at the moment!
A workmate of Robyn’s knows a helicopter pilot.
Through her, John from HeliScenic helicopter tours out of Bankstown Airport had offered us a great deal on a flight over the beaches, from Palm Beach in the north down to Cronulla, following the walk along the coast we did last year.
What a great week H!
Until John rang early Saturday morning as we were heading out to Bankstown, advising us that the low cloud meant we wouldn’t have the best experience and that we should postpone. Spending a small fortune for anything less than 100%… pretty easy decision… we postponed.
While sitting at a cafe in Eastwood having a coffee, a few suggestions from friends included
Photo: metaljar
UTS Rowers has rebuilt the clubhouse at Haberfield, so we headed over there on Sunday morning for breakfast.
A pretty limited menu in a venue that is so obviously run by people who run a club, not a cafe or restaurant!
Here’s a few tips for the good folks at UTS Rowers Club…
A great deck to sit, eat, drink and watch the world go by, but we won’t be hurrying back. There’s better value and experiences all over the inner west.
Photo: metaljar
Week 7… really happy with the idea for this weekend.
Initially we toyed with the idea of touring the new UTS Gehry (crumpled paper bag) building, but after some investigation during the week learnt that it wouldn’t be open this weekend. Perhaps in 37 weeks or so!
Last year, while walking the inner harbour foreshore, we caught a ferry to Watsons Bay from Circular Quay. On the way there, it made stop at Garden Island. This surprised us, as we had always thought that Garden Island was closed to the public.
Photo: metaljar
After a little investigation we learnt that about 10 years ago, the northern point of the island was opened to the public with the building of the Royal Australian Navy Heritage Centre, the official museum of the Royal Australian Navy, which opened in 2005.
The Heritage Centre includes a museum and some heritage buildings. The museum has some fascinating exhibits – stuff about the Japanese midget submarines that attacked Sydney Harbour during World War II etc.
The public part of the island is only accessible via ferry. It’s Crown [Navy] land and is a fully functioning base. Every arrival is met at the wharf by a security guard who’s been there for 11 years and is both a font of knowledge and a bit of a know-it-all!
The cafe, museum and gardens are open between 10am and 4pm each day.
We caught a ferry from Huntley’s Point (Riverside Girls’ High) to Circular Quay, and then changed there for the Watsons Bay Ferry. We arrived a bit late so didn’t spend hours and hours there.
Entry is free. The museum is really well laid out with some interesting stuff, all well labelled so making your way ’round the exhibits is easy.
There’s some initials carved into an exposed rock with a 1788 date making it the oldest settlement artifact on the east coast of Australia. The signal tower (an easy couple of flights of stairs) gives a terrific view of Sydney, Kings Cross and the harbour
View from the top of the signal tower
Image: metaljar
We just had a coffee at the cafe and didn’t really look at the menu.
I think it’s the sort of place that Probus clubs and the like might go during the week. I’ll enjoy going back one day.
Once again, we both commented that when you hear overseas visitors commenting on what a beautiful city Sydney is, they’re right. There’s so much to discover in out own back yard, and it’s really quite cool to be doing things here that we’ve never done before.
Garden Island Info website
Ferry timetable (you can ONLY access the public areas of Garden Island by ferry.)
 Image: metaljar |
View from the top of the signal tower |
 Image: metaljar |
And the periscope actually works! 360 degree view of the harbour. |
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OK. I will |
 Image: metaljar |
An historic 18′ skiff at Clarke Island |
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Beautiful Port Jackson Fig |
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Simply gorgeous! |
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Signal Tower |
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Signal Tower |
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From near the wharf |
So, this weekend, we... 
