Leaving Sydney

Ten days ago the removers came and took all of my worldly possessions to send them to Germany. I had spent the week before taking apart all my Ikea furniture to keep the shipping-volume down. By the end of the week I was sleeping on the sofa and living out of a suitcase.

They took four hours to pack up all 75 boxes / thingies and take them away. It was pretty stressful watching my things bump around in the back of the ute on their way up to the van.

After that I moved into George's spare room which he had kindly offered for my last week. It was surprisingly tidy, I suspect that the imminent arrive of Sha may have had something to do with this :) The last week was good fun, every night we were drinking and eating somewhere with friends. Jono and I even managed a last Pizza Tuesday.

I had the traditional pulsar farewell at Fusion before Dick left for Parkes. It was nice that so many people could come to say goodbye (and avoid the cafeteria). I sold my car and returned the house so that I could spend my last weekend in Sydney having fun rather than messing around with moving.

On my last weekend we had a little BBQ around at George's house. That day he was busy taking Sha to Manly (well there's a double entendre for you - but since it's George that I'm talking about, Manly clearly refers to the place). Anyway, Vik helped me go shopping and grab food, beer and fuel for the BBQ but we forgot to lock the house and we found Anna tidying when we returned.

I really enjoyed the BBQ. Anna burnt down George's garden, George played a duet with Sha, Sha and Jono beat everyone else at mahjong and Jo kicked my butt at Tetris.

The next day George, Sha, Jo, Vik and I headed off to Watson's Bay for nice boat ride, a short walk and a great view of the city. It was a stunning (to borrow George's favourite word) day - sunny and cloudless but not too warm.

We had fish and chips at the dock then walked around to the head. We passed a nudist beach which was a little disturbing with blokes standing around butt-naked but Sha and Jo seemed interested! We walked around the cliff-top and enjoyed views of the waves breaking against the rocks below. Vik managed to find a way down and we walked around exploring the rock-pools before the rising tide made it time to go. George, of course, managed to get wet.

Mike kindly gave me a lift with my huge bag from George's to the ATNF on Monday. I had a final morning tea and said goodbye. George, Jono, Mike, Vik and Neerag waved me off when the taxi arrived. "You're a very popular guy," said the taxi driver. They just wanted to make sure I actually left :)

Unfortunately, on the way to the airport the taxi hit a plastic bollard which then jammed under the car. We had to pull over in one of the tunnel's emergency stopping areas to remove it and check the tires. I thought this might be ominous but other than that it was a pretty smooth trip. My bag weighed 31.4 kg (which means that George's scales are accurate to within 0.2 kg) but I wasn't charged any excess.

I managed to sleep well on the flight and arrived in Frankfurt rested. I spoke German for the first time in ages when buying my train ticket. It was easy stuff but I has quite pleased with myself until I turned to leave and said 'Merci', immediately followed by 'Bollox'!

The train travelled along the bank of the Rein all the way up to Bonn. There were lots of little villages nestled between the valley sides and the river and it's really quite picturesque.

I got to MPIfR just before 0900, got set up in the guest-house and then was ready for work. I managed to stay awake until 2200 and had a very good night's sleep.

A Manly Walk

Last weekend George, Vikram, Saikia and I went for a walk in Manly. Like all of George's weekend activities it involved the loss of a precious lie-in so we could catch an early train. From Meadowbank we took the ferry down the river to Circular Quay. It was another beautiful winter's day in Sydney, the wind was cool but the sun was shining.

After my sailing trip on the harbour some time ago I had bought some drugs to try and combat the seasickness. I decided that I'd test them out on this trip under controlled circumstances.

We got to Circular Quay and had a hearty breakfast of doughnuts and coffee while we waited for the Manly ferry to arrive. The Manly ferry is infamous in Sydney for being a rough ride as you pass the Heads so I decided to take one of the pills.

The crossing wasn't bad and we arrived in Manly in time for fish and chips at Shelly beach. It was then that I discovered a side-affect of the drugs - drowsiness. Despite being midday and sunny I was about to fall asleep!

After lunch we went on a leisurely walk around North Head. We had great views of Manly and visited what George calls 'The Hidden Lagoon' but is really a big puddle on the top. Vikram did his best to scare George by trying to fall off the cliff while George spotted a couple of dead cuttlefish that he tried to persuade us were still alive.

George wanted to get wet so insisted that we sit up front on the ferry for the crossing back to Sydney. After watching the ferry crashing through the waves I took another pill. There were some decent waves and we all got wet so George was happy.

I managed to get home just in time to become comatose. I'm not sure how good these drugs are at preventing seasickness but they're very good for insomnia!

Kayaking in Sydney harbour

Today George, Dominic and I went kayaking in Sydney harbour. It was another beautiful winter day, not too warm but sunny. We went from the Spit bridge which is surrounded by little coves full of boats moored at very expensive houses. We were told that there were two types of kayak on offer, one stable but slow and the other fast but "a bit tippy". We all decided that "a bit tippy" was probably a bad idea and chose the slow, stable option.

We made our way under the Spit bridge towards a series of coves. Within minutes Dominic managed to break his rudder peddles but after a brief stop in the middle of the waterway he managed to fix them and we were under way again. We dodged boats large and small and headed towards a little rocky outcrop. There we found a swam of moon jellyfish. They're common in the harbour but still fun to watch. George and I spent some time taking photos of them. George is convinced that he also saw a sea cucumber but I think it was a bit of tree.

As we set off again there was a loud splash as Dominic capsized - totally on his own, no boat or rocks in sight. Apparently he was attempting a sharp turn but just ended up spinning on the wrong axis. Thankfully he appeared moments later laughing his head off with the look of a man who knows that by Monday morning everyone is going to have heard about it. Thankfully it wasn't far to the shore and George and I helpfully took photos while Dominic emptied his kayak.

The next cove we went into had the clearest water. We could see to the bottom and there were occasional schools of fish. I spotted a small ray resting on the bottom. I managed to get a few photos before it raced away.

Dominic was nearly dry again by the time we made it back, his ego may take longer to recover. We finished off our trip with a fish and chip supper before heading home.