Updates from Sydney

Having been in Sydney for a few months now it is about time that the blog was updated.

I flew out from the UK to Sydney with British Airways. I chose them primarily on price but I was a bit dubious about them having had a generally poor experience with them in the past. However, I have used Malaysia Airlines on a number of previous occasions, but the more that comes out about the unfortunate loss of MH370, the more I realise that I will never fly Malaysia Airlines again. It is a combination of things such as influence, culture, training of cockpit crew and the mishandling by government that puts me right off them.

I am renting a place in Kirribilli and when I look out of the window I see this view

Yes, that is the Queen Mary 2

We had has some foggy mornings

The sunsets can be good too.

The flagstaff up on observatory hill

The Manly ferry is approaching its destination

The city can be seen in the distance from this North Head monument

Manly beach

Opera House

South Head lighthouse at the harbour entrance.

Practising over the harbour prior to the Melbourne Grand Prix

The Newcastle harbour entrance

Foreshore houses seen on a trip to Paramatta

There was a big fire on the Barangaroo building site

Ocean Shield at Garden Island. It is now searching for MH370 in the Indian Ocean.

At Milsons Point

Pelicans in Woolongong

The industrial bit of Woolongong

In March I went on a heritage train trip to the wine growing area of Cessnock in the Hunter Valley.

Although I had to get a local train from here to Central first.

There was plenty of wine tasting.

Some Hunter Valley vines.

A Noisy Miner bird at Kirribilli

Disappearing on Cockatoo Island

Warehouse waterfall

Sunbathing

A Sunday morning paddle

Kirribilli as seen from the Harbour Bridge

Tinnies

Bondi Icebergs

Pink handbag outside the Customs House

On the bridge

Container ship leaves Port Botany

I have been watching the 2014 Formula 1 races on a local free to air tv channel. I must admit that the new cars sound awful so I will not be going to watch any lives races while this continues. Someone at a track described the cars as sounding like a "sewing machine on wheels". Maybe the powers that be, do not care if you do not go to watch races live, as long as you watch the races on tv. In practice that seems to mean using some sort of subscription tv service. In my case I just record or download the race and watch it at my leisure while skipping over any ad breaks. I use free to air channels or the delayed free BBC coverage.
The other thing that is spoiling F1 is the requirement to make the race run at a time so that it can be seen live during a peak viewing time in Europe. As it is a world championship series, this often results in races been run at peculiar local times of day such as dusk when the sun is at a low angle, or at night. The trend towards night races around dusty, desert circuits with no crowd seems harmful to keeping enthusiasts such as me interested. On top of that there seems to be a raft of silly new rules. For instance this year the drivers have all had to lose weight in order to meet the new weight rules with a heavier car design. Some drivers are realling struggling with weight loss and are close to being unfit to drive with the possibilty of this causing safety issues.

As my interest in F1 has waned, my interest in cricket has increased. In fact the FIA and Formula One management are pushing me away from motorsport.
Recently the World T20 championships have been taking place in Bangladesh. Both the England and Aussie men teams were knocked out before the final and I was following the fortunes of the England Women's team.
They seemed to do OK as the tournament progressed but there were some strange team selections. For instance Tammy Beaumont is supposedly a batter although she is also apparently quite good in the field. Anyway she played in four of the five matches in the tournament coming in as the number 3 bat on two occasions. Her batting average over these four matches was just 2.5 runs. Surely a more agressive batter is needed this high up the order. Although the England Women made it to the final against Australia, England were thrashed by Australia (again) on the day. During the tourament the Aussie womens scored 18 sixes (3 during the final) while the England women did not score a single six during their entire time in Bangladesh. Says it all really. I will continue to support the England Womens team and have seen them win a lot of matches in the past, but I cannot help wondering about some of these team selections, especially when many other nations teams are impoving rapidly.

Ah well, having had a bit of a whinge, it is time to get back to enjoying my remaining weeks in Sydney before I return to England under the care of British Airways.

Bye for now

Peewit