Darling Harbour and The Rocks

After the Powerhouse Museum I walked across to Darling Harbour, which was buzzing, with people everywhere as it was school holidays in NSW.

Feeling the need for some centering and contemplation (and food) I went to the Chinese Friendship Garden first. This garden is just beautiful and a wonderful place of tranquility in the midst of such a busy city. I again took loads of photos which will be of interest to the Holey Moleys.

Lots of holey windows

Some beautiful vistas including holes:

After a lovely lunch in the tearooms I walked on to the Harbourside shopping centre. Nothing very exciting there (one shopping centre is pretty much the same as another) until I came across this wonderful Baboushka shop full of Russian Baboushka dolls of every size and variety.

The old lady figure sitting in the doorway reminds me of Mags adventures in sculpture.

I then followed the foreshore walking path to The Rocks, passing some amazing buildings, some of which are literally built on the rocks.

 

 

Rather than walking all the way around to Sydney Harbour Bridge I took a ’short cut’ up the rocks (about 150 steps) to Observatory Park, the site of the Historic Sydney Observatory. From this wonderful vantage point I took these photos (again lots of holes/apertures for the Holey Moleys.

The lovely Moreton Bay fig:

And of course the Sydney Harbour Bridge:

In The Rocks itself there is of course plenty to see in terms of history and historical buildings, shopping, and galleries. I’ll just mention a couple. After a lovely moccha coffee and friand I came across a sensational button shop stocking all manner of vintage and new buttons. I just bought a few little green leaves and a gorgeous little pocket watch button.

My next wonderful stop was the Museum of Contemporary Art which had some amazing exhibitions currently showing. The first was documentary photographer, Ricky Maynard. Very much a thought provoking exhibition. I managed to get one photo of some wise words from Ricky Maynard painted on the wall of the gallery.

As some of the photos were of indigenous people who have died, it is not appropriate for me to display them here on the blog.

The second exhibition was of the Moving Image art form, a series of rooms displaying moving images sometimes simultaneously on 5 or 6 large screens. This exhibition was a collaboration with the MCA, San Diego, California. I would love to show it to my youngest son who is very much into movie making.

I’ll be back to textile art next weekend.

Cheers