New (used) car
We collected our new car last night, which we had bought from our friends Jane & Clive, who had decided to get a new one. The car is a 9 year old Ford Laser, which is not a model that's been released in the UK, and a quite standard 5 -door hatchback but hopefully it should be reliable! Sue drove it home in the dark and heavy rain, which was not ideal, but we got back safely and squeezed the 2 cars into the car port.

This means we're back to being a 2 car family and don't need to coordinate activities around the one car so much, plus hopefully the Ford will be less of a petrol guzzler than the Honda, so that we'll use it more 'around town'. This is also going to be the car that Laura will get her practice miles in once she's had a few more lessons, so not surprisingly the insurance is high!

Rebecca also went away for another school 'camp' yesterday - this time with the whole of her year as a start of school 'bonding exercise'. They've gone to an organised adventure centre about 2 hours drive up the coast, near Newcastle. The weather's not looking great for the next few days and they're back Wednesday, but we're sure she'll have a good time and she's making lots of new friends already.

Two Queens in Sydney
Apart from being Caroline's birthday, yesterday was also a big event on the Harbour as the new Queen Mary II arrived at dawn. It is apparently the 'biggest moving object' ever to have arrived in Australia and was only here for one day, leaving again at 11.30pm.

In the meantime, the QEII also arrived in the evening, which was the first meeting of these 2 liners since the first versions were here in 1941, transporting troops off to the Middle East.

Sue and I went down to the Harbour yesterday to see the QMII, which was docked at Garden Island, the only place it would 'fit'. We walked around from the Opera House and down to Woolloomooloo Wharf to get a good look, although the 'riff raff' weren't allowed too close. Still, it attracted a big crowd and it was a BIG boat!

I also took a couple of hours off today to go and see the QEII, since Sue was doing some voluntary help in the canteen at the girl's school. The liner was docked at the Overseas Passenger Terminal, where most liners are moored when they stay here. You can get up close to the ship from a viewing platform and, despite this being half the size of the QMII, it was still impressively huge and didn't look as old as 35+ years.

There are more photos of the 2 liners here.

Caroline's birthday
It was Caroline's 15th birthday today and the first for her in the summer heat. It was a school day and Rebecca had an early start for band practice, so we were all up at 6.30 for some cards and presents before Rebecca had to leave soon after 7.00. Caroline had a good day at school and when they all came home we had a 'family swim' in the pool.

Sue also had to take Rebecca to the doctor's and had an hour's wait to be seen - he was able to remove the splinters in her foot which were still hurting and we'd been unable to dig them out. She's walking better now! Sue also had some good news at the start of the day, taking a phone call from the school where she had an interview last week for a job one day a week - they've offered her the job so she'll be starting in just over a week's time.

Weekend activities
The past weekend has been quite busy for all of us. Starting on Friday night, Caroline was off with a friend's family who took her to see the drag racing at Eastern Creek, out in the west of Sydney. She came back during the day on Saturday, when Laura was at work and the rest of us had headed into Sydney to visit Chinatown for their New Year market. We caught the fast bus from nearby Forestville centre which took about 30 minutes to get into the centre and cost less than £2 each.

Once at Chinatown we started off in the nearby and very large indoor Paddy's Market - loads of stalls, including an area of fruit & veg and fish. However, the majority of the market comprised of long rows of stalls selling clothes, electrical goods and other items (including 3 wig shops in quick succession). It was cheap - and mostly tacky - but could be useful for some things!

We then walked up through the markets in Chinatown, which was interesting - particularly the carved vegetables on one stall (pictured below) and also the Spam stall, which was being advertised as the perfect addition to fried rice! We didn't realise there were so many 'flavours' of spam available!


After that, we headed to Darling Harbour and spent a few hours there, including lunch, before catching the bus back home. Rebecca then had a friend round for the night and Laura was off to a party, so I had a late night pick-up which at least gave me an excuse to watch the Arsenal-Blackburn FA Cup match live, which was a frustratingly dull 0-0 draw!

Sunday is becoming 'homework day' for Laura and Caroline, so Sue and I took Rebecca and her friend down to Curl Curl beach. Although the sea was quite calm, the girls headed off to the sea pool but Rebecca stepped on something in the pool which left her with 5 or 6 tiny spines in her heel which were quite painful to walk on, like splinters. A lifeguard tried pulling them out, with no luck, so we came back home and Sue tried with a needle and got about half out - the rest are still there at the moment...

Torrential rain
The last 24 hours has seen some very heavy showers here and today has been very wet. Sunday had started cloudy and threatening, but the sun came out for a while, which was lucky for Rebecca who was attending a friend's party on Clontarf beach. Sue and I took the opportunity to complete the final part of the Manly-Spit Bridge walk, by strolling into Manly for some lunch. We sat by the beach for a while in the hot sun and admired the storm clouds building in the distance!

In the evening the rain started and Caroline enjoyed a swim in the pool during a heavy downpour. The 1-day game between Australia and England was disrupted at the Sydney Cricket Ground and was eventually rained off, but England won the game (and the trophy amazingly!). There was also a very loud thunderstorm in the evening, with 2 cracks seemingly overhead.

Today has been wet all day with steady rain interspersed with some very heavy downpours, so the pool is filling up, the fish pond is nearly overflowing, and hopefully the Sydney dams are getting close to at least 40% full again!

Chinese New Year
The start of the Chinese New Year celebrations in Sydney started yesterday - the year of the Pig. Sue and I headed into Sydney for several hours in the evening, catching the train from nearby Roseville to Central Station, which is next to the park where the opening events were taking place. The train was quite crowded with commuters, but an easy ride of about 30 minutes.

Once at the park, we bought some food and waited for the events to begin, which comprised a series of speeches mingled with some dances and songs - very Chinese of course, with some varying degrees of enjoyment! The best was a drumming troupe, the worst was a modern 'girl band' called the Angels who had come over from China (who are on 'Quandong TV every week') and were appalling mime artists!

Once the events were officially started, a large number of very loud firecrackers were set off just next to where we were standing, and the 'pig' image was lit (pictured). We then had a quick tour around the stalls and headed home for a bottle of wine.

Band Camp
Rebecca has spent the first 3 days of this week at 'band camp', where about 50 children from the first 3-4 years of her new school went away to a nearby conference centre for some intensive music rehearsals and 'bonding' at the start of the new school year. This culminated in a performance to parents last night, so the four of us went along to see them perform - and it was very impressive! They played a combination of classical and modern (80's) tunes, plus they had 'break-out' groups playing jazz, with all of them improvising as soloists. Rebecca enjoyed the camp as a social and a music event and she was 'buzzing' after the event!

Sue and I had booked tickets for an open air cinema on the same night, before we knew of the dates for the band camp, so we had to give these away - which was fortunate, as it was raining and stormy last night, although the lightning would have added an extra backdrop to the film!

Harbour cruise
Yesterday Sue and I took Rebecca on a Captain Cook Cruise around the harbour - we'd first done this in 1993 but thought we should do it again, even though the harbour is becoming much more familiar to us now. We had some time to wait so we had a look around the Museum of Modern Art first, and the market in The Rocks, before joining the tourists after lunch to board the boat.

It was very windy at some points of the cruise, but warm and sunny, so we got a good view of many of the bays - especially on the less familiar south side of the harbour - and there was plenty of activity on the harbour as well. The commentary was poor though, with short snippets of information that made you want to know more. Still, a pleasant way to spend a Saturday afternoon!

Some photos can be seen here.