sydneysider - life's a beach

When I first got there, I stayed with Paul at his place in Randwick, before finally finding somewhere to live closer to the city centre. I moved in with Darren and Brian, who are lovely guys, and whose home is simply gorgeous. The sauna, gym, spa, and pool clinched it for me (not that I used the gym more than once)!

"Home" was technically in Redfern, which you may know is not the most desirable of Sydney suburbs, but we lived in the nice bit - miles from those riots... It's right next to Surry Hills, and smack bang next to Moore Park. Darren calls it West Woollahra, but that's just wishful thinking...

All joking aside, the neighbourhood is much more Surry Hills in character - mostly cute old terraces with the occasional apartment block, all located in these perennially leafy streets. Although I do have a thing with the trees - no-one seems to trim them. It's not the kind of place you can walk around with your head in a book. Other than that, I love it!

I was in Sydney from June 2003 to March 2004, and you can read the blow by blow accounts (if you'll excuse the expression) of my weekly life there in the June journals onwards. But it all had to end, and after a year, I went back to my life as a Londoner.