Shopping in Sydney

Monday 9/10

Lets load down our packs with some heavy books

     Since we had a free day we decided to purchase a few books that would help us on our travels. Our first stop was at a secondhand shop on Williams Street. We got two good books that seemed even more reasonably priced when we found out at the checkout that there was a 50% off sale. They were big and heavy.

     Being practical travelers we thought it smart to drop off those books at our room before making the long trek downtown, and being hungry travelers it seemed like a good idea to eat before our blood sugar got too low. We ordered a small selection of Chinese hand food and ate it at our little park near our hostel.

     Then after wiping the grease off our hands we went to a nearby shop where we found a used but current version of a book called Camps6, which lists all the cheap and free campsites around OZ. It's also big and heavy. We marched back to the hostel again to drop it off.

Buying a dongle

     Now on to the downtown business district to look for a cheap Lonely Travel Guide and to see about buying a broadband mobile device for our computer to allow us to use the internet anywhere there is phone service. It is known as a dongle in the local dialect, has anyone out there ever heard it called that? Diana and I are hardly the savviest computer gear whizzes.

     We checked a couple stores and got one with the best plan and price. We also found a bookstore where we bought a Lonely Planet guide. Neither was big or too heavy.

Urban Campers

     Doesn't all that shopping sound like fun? Hardly the sort of tourist activities we had envisioned all these years. Of course the books and atlas are essential if we're to see all the best places and not get lost (nearly everyone here we talk to is alarmed that we plan to travel without GPS). And without a dongle we'd be spending too much time looking for wifi, or even going without it (which truly would be alarming!). But in all our perambulations between Kings Cross and downtown Sydney we are getting to know the city quite well, and there are always plenty of things to see and people to observe.

     Such as the hearty urban campers. After the shops had closed and as our stomachs began to complain we took a new route back to our hostel. Cathedral Street curves and dips down from the cathedral and through a neighborhood that is missing the bustle of Darlinghurst Ave. and George St. There were fewer street lights and the windows of the buildings and apartments were mostly dark. One lonely Chinese fish and chips stand beckoned and we considered eating there, but there were no tables inside, nor any outside, and the customers were either suspect in appearance or had driven up to take quick delivery and dash off again.

     Another block and we got to the campground. No tents, grass, picnic tables, etc., but lots of people sleeping or huddling in the shadows. One person we walked by had his sleeping bag placed comfortably on top of a stack of flattened cardboard boxes, nicely positioned beneath one of the rare street lights, I suppose for nighttime reading. The office looked an awful lot like a drug rehab facility, it was closed for the night. Hearty campers indeed.

     Another block and we approached a small hotel, a single bare bulb illuminating its entrance. Squatting on the front step was a wiry young guy with tattoos snorting something from his cupped hand. He stared up at us when we passed him but didn't move or say anything. We picked up our pace and gladly turned the corner. We walked up the steps that join the lower street to the next higher one. We both felt a bit relieved and a little sheepish when we saw two chatting women and a young girl walking towards us. Maybe the neighborhood wasn't going to be the location of our doom after all.

Dinner on the terrace

     Back at the hostel we ate salad with blue cheese, bread and wine on the roof terrace. We met Clay Williams, a 41 year old Canadian/Ozzie with plugged ear lobes and his mature 19 year old Dutch girlfriend and talked for a couple hours. He had been a singer for a rock band that traveled all over Australia, and played in the U.S., Ireland, Japan and elsewhere. They had cut a couple CD's, but had fallen into discord and broken up seven years ago.

      He got a job working on a GMOW, or Giant Mobile Observational Wheel, which is most emphatically not a Ferris Wheel, although one could be excused for thinking so. For several years he and the GMOW visited many towns and cities with a traveling carnival. His chief off-work pastime was drinking with his tough old Frisian boss, and he shook his head remembering the vast quantities of beer the old man could consume without adverse effect.

     Clay and his girlfriend are now working at a couple of the hostels, sort of in a holding pattern until the next thing comes along. They both appeared to have a genuine affection for each other, are well spoken and educated, and have a good philosophy of life.. I suppose eventually the girl will be moving on to bigger and better things and Clay will be left leading his fascinating Bohemian life.