Breakfast was at Harry's Cafe de Wheels - practically a Sydney institution. We opted for the one in the corner of Cowper Wharf Road and Brougham Street. A tiger pie for me and a chili dog for the Tobs came up to AUD 11.50 but it was pretty full of meat.
Then it was on to the Royal Botanic Gardens. Thank God for the fine weather.
Take the route along the side, passing by the Andrew (Boy) Charlton Pool to reach Mrs Macquarie's Point. Her chair is not that fantastic really, plus it was super crowded with PRC tourists so we didn't want to squeeze with them. There is a mini observatory which is constantly flooded with tourists who want to get a good picture with the Opera House and Harbour Bridge in the background. But I recommend to skip this tourist-flooded place entirely. You probably will get people's heads somewhere in your picture anyway.
Walk further down along the sides of Farm Cove - I guarantee better pictures from this point. To prove my point:
Then there's the obligatory jump shots. Can you believe the husband is actually very ill on this day?
We didn't have any particular place in mind for lunch really, and was just walking around trying to find a reasonable crowded place (proves that there's good food!) to eat. And then I spotted a bit of a queue forming at 107 Pitt Street. Jamie's Italian! Totally need to pay a visit there. I rushed to join and queue and we were seated shortly. The place is not too big, with 2 levels. Felt kind of squeezy really and there's always a buzz so you can't really carry on a nice conversation without feeling the rush of the waiters and the constant chatting from the other tables.
I had a burger and Tobs ordered a truffle oil pasta. My burger was huge ass I had to split it into 2 to eat it. But the truffle oil pasta - oh my goodness. It was so good I wanted to stand up and shout after my first mouthful. The incredible thing is it looked so unassuming and plain but was so flavourful. Worth it. Went on to add another dish (Ravioli) on the suggestion of the waiter (and also cos we were greedy) but that wasn't that good. The tiramisu was interesting - served with a scoop of cream cheese on top. Total damage (mostly because we had 3 mains) AUD84.
More walking around the CBD area after lunch to cover the Museum of Australian Currency Notes (does not take more than 15 mins unless you are super duper into currency and coins) and Parliament House. The highlight was that Parliament was actually in session that day and we sat in for both the Lower and Upper House!
It was really an eye-opener. At some point in time, a Minister was questioned about some incident that took place on a highway (or the like) and was having trouble explaining it away. Then you have the other Parliamentarians (presumably opposition) shouting things like:
"Give him some movie tickets!"
To which the Minister replied something to the effect of "Don't get too excited, we all know what happened the last time you got so excited.."
To which both Tobs and I were like - seriously? Wow. Please do pop in for a short watch. It is highly entertaining.
Then I decided we should probably head back early before it gets really cold after sunset, especially since the Tobs was quite ill. After doing due research on eatability (their equivalent of our hungrygowhere), we decided to pop by Bibim, to mix at 169 William Street. It was empty and the lady boss served us. I would highly recommend the seafood pancake. It was really super good. We also had the mixed grain beef bibimbap and a tofu stew. That came up to about AUD45.
Would recommend to visit at odd hours when only the lady boss is around so that you can be reassured that your food is prepared by her. When we returned a few days later during dinner time, the pancake was prepared by one of the other staff (which we learnt is usually the case) and it was nowhere as delicious as lady boss'.
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