As per my recent Sydney post, repeat cities like Sydney and New York present blogging problems, and in this case it's compounded by the fact that I seemed to have been on a journalist strike, as my entries are sparse and mostly written while on a subsequent trip. By piecing together my writing fragments and the photos taken I have a vague idea of what I did, so I'll use that framework to largely make up any details needed to flesh this out. Actually we were in New York for a week, but I'll just do a quick blog about it to move onto some newer destinations. I worked during the day, and Somchai (surprise!) went shopping on Madison Avenue. Generally, we tend to stay downtown, mostly because we like it better and because we had an apartment in Soho. But downtown is too cool for Christmas so we spent most of our town in midtown or the East Side to get the full-on Christmas spirit. While for most people Fifth Avenue is New York shopping, we much prefer Madison Avenue. Fifth Avenue is crazy crowded, particularly at Christmas, the shops are very variable in quality and not particularly attractive. Madison Avenue in contrast, has a much quainter feel to it, and has many more unusual boutiques and one-off shops interspersed among the luxury brands.

103. New York

We flew to New York via Hong Kong and Vancouver on Cathay Pacific, which was very good flight except for the stop n Vancouver. From the plane Vancouver looked like a rainy, dreary place, which was depressing since we'd be spending a week there on the return journey. I had to work a couple days in New York, which meant staying at a hotel on our corporate list, which is usually a bad idea. This trip proved no exception, as we stayed at the W Hotel, which should be avoided at all costs. There are three W hotels in New York, but we stayed at the original (and worst) of the bunch. It used to be an undistinguished old hotel on Lexington Avenue, perhaps New York's ugliest avenue. It got tarted up in the usual W way, but as the old saying goes, it's like putting lipstick on a pig. The lobby is dark, and music thumping, hence establishing its street cred, and it had the usual absence of service. One oddity is that what few people they did have standing around and not providing service were old and unattractive, the type you'd find in KMart rather than a hip hotel. Usually staff at these types of hotels are models and actors so they at least contribute to the ambience, but here they clashed. Room was standard and on the fourth floor so you could practically see into the Lexington Avenue buses as they noisily chugged past. (Room: 4, Facilities: 5, Service: 3, Overall: 4).





We had dinner at the Heartbreak restaurant at the hotel, which wasn't bad, had a bit of design to it, though again, very "experienced" servers. And Somchai proclaimed his risotto to be the saltiest thing he has ever eaten, including salt. (Food: 10, Decor: 16, Service: 12).

New York/Vancouver December '03

Decided on another Christmas in New York, so this post will be a bit repetitive. The good news is that the previous trip was hundreds of blog posts ago so it's unlikely anyone will remember. I'm pretty sure that photos such as the Rockefeller Christmas Tree are so blindingly obvious inclusions for a New York Christmas entry that these photos must be very similar to the last time round, but I'm too lazy to check. The photos are new in any event, so very anal blog readers can compare differences in the tree this trip vs the last Christmas visit.

Dinner was at Quay restaurant, right near the hotel with killer views of the bridge and Opera House. It's another three hat restaurant, and we had a great meal here for our last night in Sydney. The look of the place is fairly controversial, and generally unpopular, although I really like it, very wallpaper magazine. I started with their signature crisp pork belly and scallops, and Somchai had a boring looking seafood dish that he proclaimed the best dish he's had in Sydney. Mains and desserts were equally strong, all served by a very charming staff. (Food-19, Decor-17, Service-19). And for the record, they introduced a new menu last year (2006) and it's now my favorite food in Sydney, although service has gotten fairly spotty.

While Oxford Street is a busy, fairly ugly thoroughfare, the surrounding Paddington and Darlinghurst neighborhoods are cute and pretty to walk around. The area was built up in the late 1800's to house Sydney's growing working class, in row after row of Sydney's now quintessential terrace houses. These Victorian gems remind many people of New Orleans because of the ornate grills on the balconies. A couple decades ago, the area became the center of the gay community, which bought these largely dilapidated homes and restored them to their original beauty.

We spent Sunday shopping, which frankly isn't a big Sydney strength. Sydney has the usual international luxury labels, but the shops are smallish and not that interesting. It's only got one high end department store, David Jones, and a decent selection of homegrown boutiques, but nothing compared to New York, Europe or even Melbourne. The main shopping district is in the CBD, but we're going to explore the CBD in a subsequent trip for blog purposes. Each of the small neighborhoods all over Sydney also has its local shopping area, which are usually cute but small and hard to get to, so not worth the effort for tourists. So that leaves Oxford Street, a big, generally ugly street that carves through Sydney, connecting the CBD to Bondi Beach. The two neighborhoods it cuts through, Paddington and Darlinghurst, are the main gay neighborhoods, so Sydney's famous Mardi Gras parade sashays down Oxford Street every March. Starting from the CBD, Oxford Street is a pretty motley collection of cheap Thai restaurants, gay bars and some very basic shops. After it passes through Taylor Square, ground zero of gay Sydney, the street smartens up, with some nice cafes and restaurants and trendy boutiques.

We had dinner with a half dozen friends at Finger Wharf, an old wharf that's been converted into the W Hotel (recently changed to the Taj Hotel), some condos, one of which houses Russell Crowe, and a half dozen good restaurants. We ate at Otto's, the best of the bunch, and food was great. In particular, my figs and goats cheese curd salad was outstanding, but all the jazzed-up Italian food is very good, and the restaurant is very fun. After dinner we headed into the wharf for drinks at the very cool bar in the lobby.

After lunch we walked around Watson's Bay for a bit. It's a five minute walk to the Pacific Ocean side, from where you can get good views of the North Head, the other part of the entrance to the Harbor, where Manly is. There's a big navy base on Watson's Bay which puts alot of Watson's Bay off limits, but there's a nude gay beach on the harbour side on the way back to the ferry if that's your cup of tea.

Watson's Bay sits on the narrow strip of land separating the Harbour from the Pacific Ocean. Doyle's is a very famous tourist trap sitting at the beach, waiting to catch tourists as they get off the ferry. It's been around for about eighty years, and has now spread to four or five different buildings, all serving the same very average seafood. But the views are great, looking all the way back to the Sydney skyline, and it's a great place to linger outdoors over some wine and oysters. But the cooked food tends to get rubbery and tasteless, so remember fresher is better. And don't be in a hurry, as service is really slow. (Food-9, Decor-12, Service-8).

The ferry then travels along what's called the Eastern Suburbs, a half dozen neighborhoods lining the harbour housing Sydney's most expensive real estate. I live in Darling Point pictured here (top floor of the building on the right with the little white boat docked in front). Because land on the harbour is so expensive, houses are crammed into every bit of space, which isn't as pretty as it should be. There are quite a few grand old homes lining the harbour, but most of the places are luxury apartments built to maximize views, which don't generally constitute great architecture. Just behind these waterfront places are the neighborhood centers, which usually have great old houses, nice cafes and quiet treelined streets. They're very nice places to walk around, and very much off the tourist circuit.

As we pull out of Circular Quay, we get great views of the bridge and opera house, including closeups of vast expanses of smoky brown glass encased in linoleum. But notwithstanding the Opera House it's still one of the most beautiful boat trips you can take. After leaving the Quay, the ferry chugs by quirky Fort Denison in the middle of the harbour. Overcautious British had it built around 1850 during the Crimean War to protect Sydney from the possibility that the Russians would somehow make it all the way down to Sydney. Needless to say the fort was never used, but nowadays it houses a nice little cafe.

Woke up late on Saturday and met our friends Murray and Jenny. We checked out the weekend market in the Rocks for a bit, which consists of people selling trinkets in an outdoor market set up to upstage the usual shops in the Rocks selling trinkets. Then we headed out on the harbour, taking a ferry to Watson's Bay for a lunch at Doyle's. There are two main tourist ferry lines, one to Manly, which is popular because it's the longest one, dropping you off on the far north shore, and the other to Watson's Bay, which also goes to the end of the harbour but stays on the south shore. I like this one better because a)it's the one I now take to and from work every day and b) it goes in and out all the bays along the way so there's lots more to see, while the Manly ferry goes straight across the harbour so you're mostly looking at water.

Had a great dinner at Rockpool, one of Sydney's two uber-famous restaurants ( the other is Tetsuya's). Neil Perry, the chef, is Sydney's first celebrity chef, but it appears he's gotten too big for his britches. Last year ('06) he was downgraded to a mere two hats, and in the just published '07 rankings he failed to regain his third hat. So Neil closed the restaurant down in retaliation, and this review is therefore pointless. Actually it sounds like he's going to open another restaurant in this space, but it will be pretty different conceptually.





If you want to know how our meal was even though you'll never have it, it was fantastic. He's known for combining heavy Asian influences with Mod Oz cuisine. We went with a tasting menu of about twelve courses, which was really interesting. Highlights included a modern take on sushi and a fantastic tea smoked duck. Unfortunately, we made the usual mistake of ordering matching wine with our courses. They always say the wine servings will be scaled down in size, but it's a lie, and you end up with a dozen glasses of wine. Anyway, it was a great meal, served very professionally, although staff seemed a bit harried and robotic. The room isn't my favorite, as its windowless and decorated a bit faux futuristically. (Food-20, Decor-13, Service-17).





Notwithstanding our massive wine intake, we then went round the Quay to the Opera Bar, underneath the Sydney Opera House. We met our friend Anita there and enjoyed a couple more hours of winedrinking outdoors along the harbour, then called it a night.

Tourists are doubly blessed at Circular Quay. Not only do they get to take in the natural beauty of the harbour, but they also get free entertainment everywhere they look. There's a neverending supply of human statues, aboriginees playing didgeridoos (is that the longest three word phrase ever?), jugglers, magicians and musicians to entertain the lucky sightseers.

You see the photo with the office buildings? That's the CBD, the central business district. In front of the buildings is Circular Quay, the ferry terminal, which you can see up close in the photo with the ferries and the Harbour Bridge as a backdrop. The left side of Circular Quay has a few apartment buildings, ending in the Sydney Opera House, and behind that is the Domain and Royal Botanical Gardens, which you saw in the previous post. And the right side of Circular Quay is the Rocks, which we just left. Circular Quay is, as you can see, not circular, and pronounced funnily (like Key). It's also ground zero of tourist Sydney, with the bridge, opera house and a ferry ride being the only must do things in Sydney. But it's also the main commuter center for the city, since all the ferries and the train terminate here.



Just between us, I think the Opera House is very overrated. From a distance, such as in Somchai's beautiful photo, it looks very avant-garde and striking, but up close it's very clearly a product of its decade, the seventies. I really like the design, but the materials, concrete and brown tinted glass, and the horrible tiles covering the place which look like kitchen linoleum, really need a makeover.

We spent the rest of the day walking around the area near the hotel, the Rocks and Circular Quay. The Rocks is the oldest part of Sydney, and is where the first prisoners who were dumped in Australia in 1788 eked out an existence. As Sydney slowly morphed from a jail to a proper city, the Rocks became the city's port. Like port cities all over the world, the Rocks was notorious for crime and vice, even more so given Sydney's prisoner heritage. As Sydney continued to prosper and distanced itself from its criminal past, the Rocks was further isolated and became the city's slum. In 1900 the plague broke out in the Rocks, and the city ended up buying almost the whole area and embarking on a demolition program to clean it up once and for all.



Redevelopment stopped in the 1970's, and what was left of the area was preserved as a heritage attraction. George Street, its main street, is now thronged with tourists shopping its quaint tourist shops, and locals getting very drunk in the many pubs, relics from its lively port days.

On Friday I worked in the morning and had lunch at Machiavelli's, the preferred restaurant of Sydney's powerlunching crowd. It's certainly the worst restaurant I've been to in Sydney, and one of the worst anywhere. It's housed in a couple of dark, windowless rooms, decorated with black and white photos of Australian politicians. Apparently it's a big deal to have your photo on the wall, and the restaurant moves them around depending on who's in and who's out. None of this is interesting to me, and as decor, it's pretty lame. Food is very basic Italian, like spaghetti and meatballs or veal parmigiano, stuff nobody's ordered in a couple decades. In keeping with the menu, the waiters are well past retirement age, and the only time you'll see them smile is in this photo. One very discordant note, the waiters are wired with a headphone and a handheld computer for taking orders, which looks really funny when wielded by an eighty year old. (Food-5, Decor-4, Service-4).

After drinks we went upstairs to est., the hotel's flagship restaurant. Sydney uses chef's hats rather than stars in its restaurant ratings, and est. is one of the half dozen Sydney restaurants awarded three hats. It's got the same Soho tin ceiling and pillared loft decor as the bar downstairs, but it's a much more rarefied environment. This happens to be one of our favorite restaurants, and we invariably bring our friends here who are visiting from out of town, but I guess I wasn't overwhelmed on this initial visit. Quoting from the journal, food was good but not very inventive or flavorful, and service was patchy and slow. I started with a very nice foie gras dish, but followed with a disappointingly bland barramundi. Somchai had a boring piece of swordfish for his main. (Food-13, Decor-18, Service-13). We did enjoy the wine though, a '92 Yalumba shiraz. Thailand has plenty of Australian wines, but usually dirt cheap, with French wines occupying the mid and upper ranges. I'm still a French wine fan, but it's fun to be introduced to a new world of high quality Australian wines here. And remember, the restaurant is much better than what I wrote here, I was probably just cranky from lack of sleep.

After work I met Somchai at the Establishment Bar in the lobby of the Establishment Hotel. The hotel is actually a rare contradiction to my opening Sydney post bemoaning the lack of unique hotels. The Establishment is a small boutique hotel with about twenty loftlike rooms in the CBD. But the lodging is something of an afterthought, as the hotel has bunch of very popular bars and restaurants which are the real moneymakers. The lobby bar is constantly packed and very rowdy, a popular meeting place for Sydney yuppies after work, which means about 3 pm here.