Swedish Midsummer In Sydney

Midsummer

I just wanted to share some photos from our amazing Swedish Midsummer that we had in Centennial Park back in the day. Since I moved here I have gotten to know a handful of Swedish people. Some from work, some from the Svenskar i Sydney group on Facebook and some through Nicole's Swedish classes. So when midsummer approached me, Sigge and Mikael decided to cook up something Swedish and invited some Swedish friends and their partners. Unfortunately Nicole couldn't make it as she was on a work trip up the Central Coast.

Trying to be Australian casual we tried to organise as little possible. We decided on a place in Centennial Park and bring a plate style pick-nick. ( Knytkalas as it is called in Swedish. ) There was no rules that the food actually needed to be Swedish but I think many were inspired to bring something Swedish for the event.

A couple of days before me and Sigge went via IKEA and picked up herring ( inlagd sill ), hard bread ( knäckebröd ) and matured cheese ( Prästost ).  I made a pretty unswedish pasta sallad, but Sigge spent the whole morning making meatballs with boiled potatoes.

I can't remember what every else brought but it was a feast and great fun. We had a beautiful sunny day as you can see, remember that it was midwinter in Australia! It was a huge success and I am already looking forward to planning a Swedish xmas dinner :)

Sigge, Filip, Sofie, Michel and Mikael chilling in the sun waiting for Jasmine and Kenny to show up

Mikael, Michel and Sigge in the grass.

For such an unplanned event it was huge success and amount of food.

Amazing Strawberry cake by Jasmine

Michel and some really lovely home made Cider

Beautiful day in Centennial Park, remember it's Winter

One of my favourites spots in Sydney, Centennial Park

Michel had made kanelbullar!

As expected in Centennial Park we got some avian visitors.

Centinnial Park

Centennial Park is one of my favourite spots in Sydney. It's within walking distance from our Apartment in Bondi Junction so we got there quite a lot to run, look at birds or just hang out on our pick nick blanket and look at the dogs. 

One of the first posts I wrote, more than a year ago now was about Centennial Park. :)

Spit Bridge to Manly Hike

Atlassian QA Team goes for a walkabout

As many of you know I work for Atlassian, a Sydney based software company that develops software for software teams. If you haven't heard of Atlassian you might have heard of JIRA or Confluence which is our two most well known products. 

Atlassian is a good company and they take care of their employees with lots of social activities. A few weeks ago the QA Team took the afternoon of for some team activities. We had two choices, either doing the Spit Bridge to Manly walk or a chocolate making course. For me it was an easy choice since I am not really a big fan of chocolate and but hiking on the other hand is something I really enjoy doing.

The Hike

I was really impressed by the hike, I had heard it was suppose to be great but still it blew me away. The hike takes you through bush land, beaches, cliff walks, great views and there is even great aboriginal rock carvings to stop and look at. Since we were doing it on a week day it was pretty much empty too, I can image that on a nice weekend it would be much more crowded.

I'd like to go back when I have more time, bring some picnic and stop at some beach or view point along the hike and chill out. Bring my binoculars and maybe my bird book. 

You can read more about the hike at

• http://short-walks.com.au/new-south-wales/sydney/spit-bridge-to-manly-walk/
• Trip Advisor

Here are some photos from the hike, they do not really do the walk justice but should give you an idea of how beautiful it is. Click for larger version.

Sandy Bay

The plane wrote "Fix Trains" in the sky 

Brush Turkey getting ready to jump it.

My colleagues Glenn and Mikael chasing a brush turkey.

The water is crystal clear, wouldn't mind going for a swim here.

We did a halfway stop at Grotto Point which has plenty of Aboriginal Stone Carvings.

South Head in the distance.

Here you can see parts of Manly and North Head.

View towards Manly

Some statistics

4 Pines Brewery

After the hike both groups, hikers and chocolate makes meet up at the 4 Pines Brewery, a brewery in Manly, for dinner and drinks. The food was alright and I really enjoyed the drinks. We got tasting platters which I am not a big fan of, but the rest of the menu looked great. I'd definitely go back back for a veggie burger or veggie schnitzel. 

http://www.4pinesbeer.com.au/

Kookaburra on the balcony

A few weeks ago we got a visitor on the balcony. 

We woke up hearing a crazy laughing sound come from the balcony, dazed I said to Nicole. "Nicole, Nicole. There is a monkey on the balcony!" knowing well that there i no monkeys in Australia.

Of course, it was no monkey but a Laughing Kookaburra.  

Kookaburras have a strange call that sounds like laughter, it goes through cycles where it sometimes sounds like it is having a conversation with someone.

Check out a video, not mine, of a laughing kookaburra.

We have had a couple of visit of Kookaburras on the balcony since then. On one occasion we had three of them on the balcony at the same time having a little orchestra. Unfortunately I didn't get any photos of that.

There are two species of of Kookaburras in Australia.

• Laughing Kookaburra, are really common here in Sydney and I have seen several dozen of them. That's the kind that visit our balcony.
•  Blue-winged Kookaburra. I have only seen theses at a wildlife park but would love to see them in the wild one day.

I really love the bird life of Australia, there are so many strange and exotic birds here that we don't get in Sweden.
Check out my post on Centennial Park for more bird photos.

Thanks for reading!

Katoomba - Blue Mountains - Part 2

Our second day of Katoomba we started slow. After a few beers at the RSL and a bottle of wine at the hotelroom we were not the earliest guests out of the hotel. We just managed to catch the hotel breakfast in the Grand Dining room before it closed at 10 am. After checking out and the late breakfast we strolled around town for a while. I picked up a climbing guide for the Blue Mountains and then we strolled into a cafe where I had a coffee while Nicole sipped on hot chocolate.

Hike 2: Echo Point - Scenic World

After coffee we headed out for our hike. Like yesterday we started at Echo Point and headed down the giant stair case, past three sisters, all 894 steps to the bottom.

Map

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It was a pretty easy hike which again took us about 3 hours including stops for photos and admiring amazing views, birds and crazy big trees.

 Currawong up in tree

 View about half way.

XXXL tree.

Nicole posing in front of a huge and very old Turpentine Tree

At the end of our hike was Scenic World which is a collection of Cable Cars, Boardwalks, Miners Village and a Scenic Railway. It was pretty touristy with plenty of school kids. So it was a bit crowded but that didn't stop us for really enjoying the views, which were breath taking.
http://www.scenicworld.com.au/

View from Scenic World

Continued view from Scenic World.

Check out those crazy trees.

Nicole pretending to be a 1900 century coal miner.

Apart from plenty of views Scenic World is also a Miners "museum" of sorts with lots of plaques with information and old mining equipment on display.

If you energy to spare after the hike and don't feel like being crowded at Scenic World then you can climb it yourself using the Furber Steps which you can take to the top. But beware that it is 900 vertical meters that you need to climb.

The Cable Car was closed so we took the Scenic Railway, which is the steepest passenger railway in the world, to the top and headed back into town. We were both pretty tired and happy after a wonderful hike. But also starving since we hadn't eaten since breakfast. There are plenty of options to eat in Katoomba which seems great. I can recommend "Common Grounds Cafe" for good pumpkin soup or a delicious veggie burger.

But the best place we found without question was the Unique Patisserie which except for displaying delicious looking pastry and cakes also served Malaysian/Penang food which was well priced and absolutely delicious.
https://www.facebook.com/UniquePatisserie

Tofu with bean sauce from Unique Patisserie. Yummy. Ate half the salad before I took the picture. Sorry. :P

After food and Chocolate Pudding we picked up our bags from The Carrington and headed to the train station. We sleept most of the way home happy with tired legs and full bellies.

I really enjoyed my first visit to the Blue Mountains and Katoomba and can really see us going back there many more times. I would love to visit some of the other towns next time, like Wentworth Falls or Blackheath.

Thank you for reading!

Katoomba - Blue Mountains

Our first out-of-Sydney trip went to Katoomba up in the Blue Mountains. It's a great place to start exploring the Blue Mountains. It's a bit touristy down the main street but once you get off that there were hardly any people. Bear in mind that we were there during winter which I assume is some kind of low-season.

Map

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Getting There
Katoomba is easy to get to using public transport. It's a 2 h, $9 train ride from Sydney Central.
131500 is a great place to check the train times and plan your trip.
http://www.131500.com.au/

The Carrington
The Carrington is a 100+ year old hotel in Katoomba close to the train station. There are many places to stay in the city naturally being a popular tourist destination but The Carrington is by far the most stylish place. It looks like something out of "The Shining" or an old Agatha Christie novel. We had the colonial room which didn't have the expected bath but a huge bed and high ceiling which gave that old time feeling.

Hike 1, Echo Point - Leura Forest
Map:

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The hike from Echo Point to Leura Forest was an easy but fun and beautiful hike. It took us about 3 hours to do the trip including lots of stops for photos and fika.

From Echo Point you get a great view over the 3 sisters which is 3 pillars of rock reaching up into the sky. The sisters are of importance in Aboriginal dream-time mythology.
http://www.bluemts.com.au/info/thingstodo/threesisters/

Crimson Rosella

View from the three sisters platform.

From Echo Point you start the giant staircase towards the bottom of the valley. About 100 steps from the top there is a platform at the foot of the three sisters. The views are wonderful as you can see in the photos above and below. Most people stop here and then walk back up again. We continued all the way to the bottom to do our hike. It was a total of 894 steps from top to bottom. Nicole counted them ;)

 Nicole at the Three Sisters Platform.

Currawong

 A fallen tree opens up the forest so you can see the thick rain forest. Only a few areas in New South Wales have rain forest. It requires not only heat and plenty of rain, but also it needs to be shielded from the dry winds. 

 Climbing a rock in Leura Forest. 

About 45 minutes after reaching the bottom of the stairs is Leura Forest. It's a beautiful place full of wildlife and thick rain forest. We found a camp site where big boulders are scattered and blended with trestle tables. We took a short break playing around on the rocks.

Continuing from Leura Forest we soon reached the stairways to the top. Another 900ish steps awaited us, we didn't count them this time.

Marguerite Cascades are found halfway up the stairs.

Parts of the stairs up to the top is a boardwalk since it would be too steep too walk. Some parts are also overgrown and go below the cliffs like this one.

 Old graffiti from 1914!

At the top of the stairs this magical view awaited us which made the hike feel extremely rewarding. Look carefully for the flocks of Cockatoos down in the valley.

Found this great mural on our walk back from the Hike. Can you name all the animals?

Our first day in Katoomba was great with a beautiful hike and a stroll through town and dinner at the RSL. Check back soon for a post about the next days hike.