28 March 2011 - Lane Cove National Park, Sydney, NSW

It is late as I pick this up for updating. I have been on Skype “talking” to Olly about the problems I am having with this blog: the disappearance of the photos and the auto inset of paragraphs. I say “talking” because we communicate by typing messages to one another rather than video or voice. It is effective but not good for opening family to family communication. I fear that Charlie and Matthew may forget who we are!

We have braved the weather today and ventured out on yet another adventure. Just after ten this morning, after I had installed the corned beef in the crockpot and Chris had installed the new smoke alarm on the ceiling, we set out for the station, travelling in to Wynyard, then to Circular Quay, and then catching the Paramatta River Cat by the skin of our teeth. The last connection was complicated by the fact that when Chris inserted his weekly pass in to the ticket machine to pass through, it would not function. He tried several times, and then we decided it must have expired, so he went back to the ticket office to buy a couple of new weekly passes. In the meantime, I was down at the ferry ramp and there was two minutes left before departure. I explained the dilemma to one of the workers, and she ran with me searching for Chris, saying we should have simply complained to the gate keeper. Chris was just emerging from the ticket sales kiosk, and all three of us ran back down the wharf to the ferry as it pulled away.

The trip up the harbour was even more enjoyable than that taken last week when we went all the way to Parramatta, because this time we called in at wharves on the way up and had a closer look at the shore. We alighted at Homebush Bay, the Olympic Park terminal, caught a bus up to the Park and headed for the information office.

Views back to the city from Olympic Park

A trip to Olympic Park had been on Chris’s must-do list, and having no objections, I was pleased to tag along. Of course I knew that the 2000 Olympic Games had been held here in Sydney, and that there had been great construction carried out for that purpose. What I did not know was that the development for the sports and events village had been started before it was a forgone conclusion that they could be held in Sydney. The Park is still a busy place, location for many great games and events and call centres for the Commonwealth Bank and others.

We ascended to the 17^th floor of the Novatel Hotel where there is an observation area, from where one can see over the whole development and also has wonderful views back to the city. We visited the Cathy Freeman Park where the Cauldron is now placed, and a couple of other related sculptures, the Games Memory Poles, 480 outside the Olympic Stadium which is now the ANZ stadium, commemorating the volunteers who assisted with the games, the 1.5 kilometre Olympic Boulevard with it’s lighting towers each named after a city that has hosted an Olympic Games, the fountain and wetland at the end of the Boulevard and the Brickpit Ring Walk, and of course wandering about the area as a whole and seeing the various other venues.

The Brickpit Ring

I was particularly taken with the Brickpit Ring Walk. This whole area, where the Olympic Park now is, was originally the location of an abattoir, a rubbish tip and a brick works. The quarry where this brick works now is now a conservation refuge for Green and Golden Bell Frogs. An elevated circular walkway with viewing platforms take one 18 metres above the floor of this previous industrial site. The large pit is now a lake, covered in green slime, enjoyed by a variety of birds and frogs. The walkway is well illustrated with signage telling the history of this place; it is truly a capsule of Australian political and commercial history, having been state owned, then privatised, then state owned again, sabotaged and rebuilt and now abandoned. There was also a little snippet of information I found most interesting in this time where we lament the impossibility of young people owning their own homes. In 1911, the price of an average house was equal to eight years of he average wage. Today (or at least when the comment was written) on an average annual income of $50,000, an average home cost $400,000 (eight times an annual income), so really the cost of a house is no different to what it was 100 years ago!

We found our way to the rail station and caught the train to Lidcombe, then to Chatswood, and from there back to our local at North Ryde.

I was relieved to open the caravan door and find that the slow cooker had not boiled over and through the van, but that the meat smelled wonderful and all was well and ready for Chris to compliment the meal with vegetable preparation. As he gathered the veges from the frig, Ken, who is actually John, arrived again with his chair and his half finished beer. We were again entertained by him and finally rescued when his lovely wife arrived, stayed briefly and then suggested they leave us to our dinner. She is obviously a practical woman.