Filling the gaps

(North Sydney - sunset)

Been so busy 'doing' 'stuff' in the last month that it took me forever to galvanise myself and update the website on Tasmania. That feels like ages ago now and I've been up to lots of other stuff...

Main news is that I have found somewhere to live... And it's not a youth hostel....

In fact it's really posh.

Sydney can be split into north, south, east and west regions. At least, that's the way Sydney Buses carve up the city for the purpose of organising their bus routes. East Sydney covers all the beaches and posh areas south of the harbour (eg Bondi, Bronte, Paddington etc). South Sydney covers everything from the central business district to the airport. West Sydney is best forgotten about and North Sydney is everything north of the harbour, including all the posh little bays that the ferries go to from the main ferry port. Through persistence and sheer luck I've managed to get myself a room in the poshest postcode in town.

(Surfer - Kiama beach)

I'm living on a little peninsula called Cremorne Point. Originally a park and gardens in the nineteenth century, most of the houses were built in the 1920s and 1930s and are designed in a fantastic artistic and ornate style with touches of art nouveau and classical architecture.

(Above - view out of the dining room window.)

The house I'm living in has been converted into five apartments and I am sharing one of these apartments with an Australian couple. The flat itself seems very comfortable and 'well presented'. More exciting is my commute to work, which consists of a one-minute walk through the trees to a tiny ferry pier, from where I catch a ferry for a 15 minute journey across the harbour between the Opera House and the Harbour and then have a 5 minute walk to work. To be honest, it's not the most practical location in town - especially when leaving the 24-hour bars in town - but it's a pretty special place to stay for a couple of months.

(Below - view from the ferry on the way to work.)

Another big development - for the blog at least - is an investment in a new camera. This was a bit of a birthday present for myself. I've become very keen on photography since starting this trip and wanted something a bit more professional that would give me better results. The camera arrived just in time for the Tasmania trip so hopefully you can tell the difference!

(Right - ok it's only a seagull! But it was pretty far away... Hopefully a sign of better wildlife photography to come.)

I've also since bought wide angle and telephoto lenses for the camera. The wide-angle will allow for panoramic shots, while I can now get 24x optical zoom which should be able to get some extreme close-ups and hopefully more effective wildlife pictures.

(Canon S3-IS. 6.0MP and 12x optical zoom. Right with telephoto lens.)

(Really pleased with results so far as the following shots hopefully show...)

(Above - wide angle gives a pretty satisfying panoramic shot. This is taken from the roof of the hostel I stayed in for a few days in Darlinghurst. The Sydney Tower - tallest building in Sydney - is in the centre of the shot, at a distance of about a mile)

(Above - at maximum zoom (24x) you get a pretty good close-up of the top of the Sydney Tower from the same position)

Work on Chris' house is going a great rate and he hopes to be in by Easter. That's largely due to professionals taking over the trickier work! Above shows the end of a long day back when the amateurs were running the show.

Lastly, it was good to catch up with fellow travellers from South America on email last week - and to catch up with Alison in person. Here's a great photo I just got sent to me from Christmas Day