Happy Chinese New Year!
Friday night we went to Parramatta for the Twilight Noodle Market for some Chinese New Year festivities. It was fairly pathetic but the kids enjoyed it. There were three bouncy castles and a tea cup ride; a handful of food stalls like the PNE but the food was pretty yucky
; a salsa six piece latin band which was pretty entertaining. The evening ended with rain but fun was had by all.
Saturday we attended the teacher's exchange picnic. It was supposed to be an outdoor event but we were rained out and ended up in a hall at Concord Public School. We met a variety of teachers from mainly Canada (Ottawa, Calgary), US (Seattle) and the UK living in the Sydney area. We ate lunch, shared some stories and left for the beach.
By the afternoon the weather
had cleared up so we decided to head to Bondi Beach - the most famous beach in the world. At first, we were doubtful of Bondi's notoriety . It looked like every other beach in Australia. However, as the hours went by, and the light started changing, it was a gorgeous sight. It was especially quiet because the weather had been poor earlier in the day. It was nice to see it not so busy and hectic. The beach is 1 km long but very deep with fine white sand. The boardwalk provides city dwellers a place to walk and enjoy the scenery. There were shops, restaurants and cafes all along Campbell Parade. The cliffs at both ends of the beach were breathtaking. Okay, Bondi is pretty darn nice for a city beach!
On our way home to Northmead, we witnessed an amazing sight above the city centre, up in the deep, dark blue sky. The fruitbats fly from the Botanical Gardens head to the eastern suburbs at dusk. Hundreds of bats flying above us. It's pretty amazing.
On Sunday, we spent some time chatting and skyping family and friends. A special Happy Birthday to Granda who turned 75 on the weekend!! We're wishing John a year of good health and many laughs. By 1 pm, we finally got our gear ready and headed to the beach. The skies were blue and we felt we had better jump on the opportunity before the rain starts again. We headed to the Northern beaches. That decision is based mainly on trying to avoid the tolled highways. We decided to go to Avalon and Newport. Avalon was quite beautiful but swimming was prohibited. The girls played in the playground, we had some lunch and coffee and headed out. The Northern beaches reminds us of California with it's dramatic cliffs & waves, multi-million dollar homes and ritzy shops. There were lots of families at the Avalon playground - all very yuppy and Yaletown like.
Late afternoon, we drove back down to Newport and spent a few hours at the empty beach building sand castles and collecting shells. There were lots of people hang-gliding and surfing. It was a fun beach.
Well, that was another full weekend.
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