Week 3
It has really
started to hot up this week, but it didn’t stop over 100 kids, including Dylan
and Cerys, from attending practice at the Allambie Heights Oval for the local Australian
Rules Football team. You can tell that
this is the most popular sport in Australia.
Our two got
stuck in with the others and really enjoyed it.
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| Dylan positioning the ball correctly |
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| Before kicking it |
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| Cerys waiting her turn |
Over the next
couple of days the temperature rose to 40+ and I have to admit, I hid from
it. For me, shopping in an air
conditioned supermarket was preferable to being out in the sun while it stayed
that hot.
By Wednesday it
had cooled down somewhat and I decided to find a little known beach called
Collins Flat Beach.
Whether you’re
swimming in the calm waters or nibbling on your snacks from the hamper, this
hidden beach, with a breathtaking view across The Heads, feels a world away
from the hustle and bustle of the city.
The reason I
chose to seek out this beach was because I had read of this it being home to a
waterfall and some very small penguins. Unfortunately when I got there the
river feeding the waterfall was dry and there was no sign of the little penguins. Still, it was a lovely beach and it would be
nice to come back to.
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| This was what I was hoping to see! |
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| And this was what I got. |
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| And these were the penguins that I missed |
On Friday I took
Cerys to school and went for a drive down to Roseville Chase and the Garigal
National Park.
A magical place I will be
coming back to quite often. Garigal National Park is a relatively small park in
the northern suburbs of Sydney. It has two main sections, separated by Forest
Way in Belrose. The southern section, formerly the Davidson State Recrecreation
Area, protects the catchment of Middle Harbour Creek, which flows into Middle
Harbour. This is the area I was visiting
today. The park in this section mainly
covers the areas directly around the waterways, and does not extend far on to
the ridges. There is a picnic area next to Roseville Bridge in this part of the
park.
The northern
section, which I have yet to explore, protects the catchment of Deep Creek,
flowing into Narrabeen Lakes. This is a more substantial section of the park
covering a block of bushland. The area is quite steep with small escarpments
dissecting the sandstone plateaux. I’ll
probably explore this area next week.
In the evening Alfie dropped me off at Manley Wharf where I caught the Fast Ferry
to Circular Quay.
I was going to the
Opera House to see Wozzeck, the first
opera by the Austrian composer Alban Berg. It was composed between 1914 and
1922 and first performed in 1925. After I had picked up my ticket at the box office I had a couple of drinks in the Opera House Lounge before the performance.
The opera is based on the drama Woyzeck,
which was left incomplete by the German playwright Georg Büchner at his death.
Berg attended the first production in Vienna of Büchner's play on 5 May 1914,
and knew at once that he wanted to base an opera on it. From the fragments of
unordered scenes left by Büchner, Berg selected fifteen to form a compact
structure of three acts with five scenes each. He adapted the libretto himself,
retaining "the essential character of the play, with its many short
scenes, its abrupt and sometimes brutal language, and its stark, if haunted,
realism..."
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| A couple of scenes from the opera |
Alban Berg was
also the composer of the Opera ‘Lulu’ which Kevin and I travelled to Leipzig to
see last year.
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| Alban Berg |
After a
thoroughly enjoyable evening I caught the ferry back to Manly.
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