Downtown again...
On Thursday (03.03.05), I was scheduled to meet up with Fred MacLeod, a man whom Dad met while on a plane out of Halifax. Fred is from Sydney, NS, but for the past 25 years has lived here in Sydney, NSW. I took the RiverCat ferry in to Circular Quay and arrived at 11am, but I could not meet with Fred until 12:30, so I had a bit of a wander around CBD. As with most large cities, there are the tall skyscrapers...
Tall Tower
Another tall tower
...but I was more amazed with the contrast you see downtown, between the new and the old.
Contrast
This particular building is the Queen Victoria Building, built in 1898 to replace the Sydney Market which previously occupied the area. It's a very posh mall with lots of very high end stores. This is Her Majesty herself sitting in front of it...
Queen Victoria Building
Just across the street is Town Hall...
Town Hall
There's one particular alleyway where it seems most of the people who work in downtown, but ride rather than drive in, park their bikes. For the bike lovers that read this, here's one I liked.
Ducati Monster
Around 12, I walked past a "Boost" juice bar and decided to get one, as I'd had one previously in Manly and loved it. All my life, I've not been much of a fan of fruit. Nearly all fruits I love the taste of, but despise everything else about them, such as the texture, the seeds, et cetera et cetera. What they do here is make cold blends though, with fresh fruit, so I get all the taste, all the healthy stuff, but none of the stuff I don't like! My particular favorite (actually it's the only one I've tried so far ;)) is the Skinny Dip, which is a combination of "100% pure apple juice," strawberries, raspberries, bananas, and "TD2 low-fat frozen yogurt." They're very refreshing, especially on a hot day, are touted as being healthy, and are very tasty as well. Unfortunately, they're somewhat expensive, at $5.60. I really should start watching them make them - I already know the ingredients, but I imagine incorrect quantites of any ingredient could make it very, very wrong... At 12:25, I entered the building Fred works in. He works on the 21st floor, however, it would be the 23rd floor back home, as what we call the 2nd floor is the 1st floor here, and also, they have a 13th floor. In fact, I entered the elevator, looked at the button panel, and had a period of head scratching as I noted the elevator only went up to floor 13. I figured it best to head up to there anyways, and hopefully there would be a new set of elevators that proceed further, or else I've got a good stair climb in front of me... When I got off, I noticed a new set of lifts which went from 13 to the top, so up I went. Fred decided to show me the view from his office, which was incredible.
Sydney Harbour
Following him out of the office, we went to the set of elevators I'd just departed from, but this time I noted that he did not press the button for 13, but the one marked "G" instead. If only I'd looked around the corner on the ground floor in the first place.... We went to the restaurant in the underground level of his office building, which was very nice indeed. As an entrée I had Tuna Carpaccio, which was small, thin slices of raw tuna underneath some grated cucumber and red apple, and dressed with grape seed oil. I'm not much of a seafood person at all, and wasn't entirely thrilled about the prospect of eating raw fish, but I was pleasantly surprised. I certainly won't make it part of my own menu, but it was pretty good. I had conjured up images of a thick slab of bloody, raw fish full of the millions of bones fish seem to have, but they were very thin slices. The texture reminded me of those thin, rectangular "Fruit On The Go" snacks. After the entrée, I decided upon one of their daily specials for the main course - kangaroo. I was a little hesitant about this as well, but I figured I've got to try it sometime, and I might as well make it in the first portion of my Australian adventure, just in case I like it and want more. I want more. It was excellent. It's an extremely lean meat, so there was not even the tiniest sliver of fat to be found. It looks and has the texture of steak, but has a touch of spice to it - tasted to me like a mix of steak and sausage. Don't worry like I did about the kangaroos - they're actually pests down here, and as plentiful as the deer in Canada. Anyways, the meat was on a bed of rice, asparagus, and mushrooms soaked in what seemed to be molasses, strangely enough. It was good. Those who know my tastes in food know that I despise mushrooms, but I managed. With the small mushrooms, I would scoop one up with a whole rest-of-the-fork-full of rice and barely notice it, but there were some very large, intimidating mushrooms as well. These were monsters - stalks perhaps two inches long and heads of the same diameter. I bit the bullet and threw one in my mouth, but after fighting about 3 consecutive gag reflexes before swallowing, I decided I best push the others aside. Finally, for dessert, I had another daily special, espresso crème brûlée, which was incredibly good. Just to make it that much more special, I washed it all down with a long black espresso. MM caffiene... By this point, we'd been in the restaurant for two hours, and Fred had a scheduled conference call he had to go to, so we parted ways. I called Glenn and he came up from Rockdale. We wandered around a bit more, this time entering the Queen Victoria building. We went up to the top floor, from where you can, surprise surprise, look down and see the bottom floor. Oh, and they've got these shiny things, called the crown jewels or something insignificant like that. ;)
Big clock
Inside the Queen Victoria Building
Me with the Crown Jewels
Look out below!
Finally, because I just can't seem to make a post without a car, here's a crazy modified Toyota Hiace. Don't ask.
Crazy modified Toyota Hiace
Tall Tower
Another tall tower
...but I was more amazed with the contrast you see downtown, between the new and the old.
Contrast
This particular building is the Queen Victoria Building, built in 1898 to replace the Sydney Market which previously occupied the area. It's a very posh mall with lots of very high end stores. This is Her Majesty herself sitting in front of it...
Queen Victoria Building
Just across the street is Town Hall...
Town Hall
There's one particular alleyway where it seems most of the people who work in downtown, but ride rather than drive in, park their bikes. For the bike lovers that read this, here's one I liked.
Ducati Monster
Around 12, I walked past a "Boost" juice bar and decided to get one, as I'd had one previously in Manly and loved it. All my life, I've not been much of a fan of fruit. Nearly all fruits I love the taste of, but despise everything else about them, such as the texture, the seeds, et cetera et cetera. What they do here is make cold blends though, with fresh fruit, so I get all the taste, all the healthy stuff, but none of the stuff I don't like! My particular favorite (actually it's the only one I've tried so far ;)) is the Skinny Dip, which is a combination of "100% pure apple juice," strawberries, raspberries, bananas, and "TD2 low-fat frozen yogurt." They're very refreshing, especially on a hot day, are touted as being healthy, and are very tasty as well. Unfortunately, they're somewhat expensive, at $5.60. I really should start watching them make them - I already know the ingredients, but I imagine incorrect quantites of any ingredient could make it very, very wrong... At 12:25, I entered the building Fred works in. He works on the 21st floor, however, it would be the 23rd floor back home, as what we call the 2nd floor is the 1st floor here, and also, they have a 13th floor. In fact, I entered the elevator, looked at the button panel, and had a period of head scratching as I noted the elevator only went up to floor 13. I figured it best to head up to there anyways, and hopefully there would be a new set of elevators that proceed further, or else I've got a good stair climb in front of me... When I got off, I noticed a new set of lifts which went from 13 to the top, so up I went. Fred decided to show me the view from his office, which was incredible.
Sydney Harbour
Following him out of the office, we went to the set of elevators I'd just departed from, but this time I noted that he did not press the button for 13, but the one marked "G" instead. If only I'd looked around the corner on the ground floor in the first place.... We went to the restaurant in the underground level of his office building, which was very nice indeed. As an entrée I had Tuna Carpaccio, which was small, thin slices of raw tuna underneath some grated cucumber and red apple, and dressed with grape seed oil. I'm not much of a seafood person at all, and wasn't entirely thrilled about the prospect of eating raw fish, but I was pleasantly surprised. I certainly won't make it part of my own menu, but it was pretty good. I had conjured up images of a thick slab of bloody, raw fish full of the millions of bones fish seem to have, but they were very thin slices. The texture reminded me of those thin, rectangular "Fruit On The Go" snacks. After the entrée, I decided upon one of their daily specials for the main course - kangaroo. I was a little hesitant about this as well, but I figured I've got to try it sometime, and I might as well make it in the first portion of my Australian adventure, just in case I like it and want more. I want more. It was excellent. It's an extremely lean meat, so there was not even the tiniest sliver of fat to be found. It looks and has the texture of steak, but has a touch of spice to it - tasted to me like a mix of steak and sausage. Don't worry like I did about the kangaroos - they're actually pests down here, and as plentiful as the deer in Canada. Anyways, the meat was on a bed of rice, asparagus, and mushrooms soaked in what seemed to be molasses, strangely enough. It was good. Those who know my tastes in food know that I despise mushrooms, but I managed. With the small mushrooms, I would scoop one up with a whole rest-of-the-fork-full of rice and barely notice it, but there were some very large, intimidating mushrooms as well. These were monsters - stalks perhaps two inches long and heads of the same diameter. I bit the bullet and threw one in my mouth, but after fighting about 3 consecutive gag reflexes before swallowing, I decided I best push the others aside. Finally, for dessert, I had another daily special, espresso crème brûlée, which was incredibly good. Just to make it that much more special, I washed it all down with a long black espresso. MM caffiene... By this point, we'd been in the restaurant for two hours, and Fred had a scheduled conference call he had to go to, so we parted ways. I called Glenn and he came up from Rockdale. We wandered around a bit more, this time entering the Queen Victoria building. We went up to the top floor, from where you can, surprise surprise, look down and see the bottom floor. Oh, and they've got these shiny things, called the crown jewels or something insignificant like that. ;)
Big clock
Inside the Queen Victoria Building
Me with the Crown Jewels
Look out below!
Finally, because I just can't seem to make a post without a car, here's a crazy modified Toyota Hiace. Don't ask.
Crazy modified Toyota Hiace
posted by Mark Brown at 7:58 pm
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