weekend walks: the rocks

Posted on March 16, 2014 Updated on March 16, 2014

Just in time for St Patrick’s Day we visited St Patrick’s Church in Sydney City, for the first time ever, the traditional heartland of Sydney’s Irish working class Catholics.

St Patrick's himself — St Patrick’s himself

Well, we didn’t only visit St Patrick’s, we spent 2 hours walking approximately 7km around Circular Quay and The Rocks. The City of Sydney have very useful Historical Walking Tour brochures which we used this week while playing tourists in our home city. We chose to do the COLONY walk. And we saw things that we had walked past a thousand times in our lifetime but never really stopped to learn about it or even really “look” at it.

Customs House - where shipping was cleared and goods were taxed — Customs House – where shipping was cleared and goods were taxed

The flag post where the first British flag was raised. The flag flies permanently here. — The flag post where the first British flag was raised. The flag still flies permanently here

The original anchor of the ship that sailed into Sydney Cove back in 1788. — The original anchor of the ship that sailed into Sydney Cove back in 1788

Old steps leading to Cumberland Place and Susannah Place. — Old steps leading to Cumberland Place and Susannah Place

Susannah's Place - a museum into the lives of the mid-19th century residents — Susannah Place – a museum into the lives of the mid-19th century residents

The entrance to Susannah's place - unfortunately it was closed. — The entrance to Susannah place – unfortunately it was closed

View from Observatory Hill towards Walsh Bay Wharves

Iconic Moreton Bay Fig trees on Observatory Hill with the Harbour Bridge just peaking through

Lord Nelson Hotel - one of the oldest pubs in Sydney — Lord Nelson Hotel – one of the oldest pubs in Sydney

Garrison Church - the first official military church in the state. — Garrison Church – the first official military church in the state

Walsh Bay Wharves - established in 1901 to contain the chaos at Sydney's waterfront — Walsh Bay Wharves – established in 1901 to contain the chaos at Sydney’s waterfront

One of several murals painted on Cumberland St. — One of several murals painted on Cumberland St

Our wedding reception (thrown in for good measure) — Our wedding reception venue (thrown in for good measure)

We are a day early but Happy St Patrick’s Day 🙂

Have a great week ahead.

This entry was posted in Australia, New South Wales, Oceania, Weekend Walks and tagged historical walk, history, St Patrick's Day, Sydney, The Rocks, weekend walk.

25 thoughts on “weekend walks: the rocks”

Andy Oldham said:
March 22, 2014 at 11:47 am

Beautiful photography!

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 22, 2014 at 12:08 pm

Thank you 🙂

Savvy Kenya (@savvykenya) said:
March 18, 2014 at 8:53 pm

Thanks for the pics, as one reader above commented, Sydney now added to my endless bucket list of things to see…. 😉

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 18, 2014 at 9:00 pm

Always happy to share with everyone a bit of where we call home 🙂

Well, we hope you get to visit here one day and if you are ever in Sydney, please do let us know!

PonderTheIrrelevant said:
March 18, 2014 at 4:23 am

Slainte! Lovely photos! I especially love the one heading down to the wharves – great perspective. It sounds like a lovely walk 🙂

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 18, 2014 at 5:52 am

Thank you so much 🙂 The walk was very pleasant and it helped with the weather being so perfect too!

ourworldheritagebe - Annick said:
March 17, 2014 at 8:58 pm

The more I see of Sydney, the more I know it’s a city I am going to love 🙂 One more on our endless bucket list of things to see…. 😉

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 9:33 pm

Well, we hope you do get here one day and if you ever do, make sure you let us know 🙂
Sydney is a lovely place – but we are bias 😉

Wes Walker said:
March 17, 2014 at 8:13 pm

I love The Rocks. Have you seen the excavations under the YHA? Pretty cool.

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 8:16 pm

Yes we did. And actually we had no idea about them until we did this walk and saw it!! The Rocks is a really cool part of town 🙂

kayrpea61 said:
March 17, 2014 at 4:26 pm

Pity Susannah Place was closed, that really is very interesting. Glad you managed to avoid getting drenched on this walk 🙂

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 5:07 pm

Haha – yes we were grateful the sun stayed out until after we were safely in the car before he storm blew through!
We are thinking we’d like to go back and see Susannah Place as neither of us has been before!

'CC' Richards, Daytripper Sippers said:
March 20, 2014 at 6:10 am

Great photos! Some of my favourite places.
Make sure you get to Susannah Place Museum some time. Each of the four houses is set up in a different era, showing you how it was for one of the families who lived there. Fascinating. The Rocks Museum near the Argyle Centre is great too. They have lots of artefacts that were found there. Cheerio, CC

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 20, 2014 at 6:19 am

Thanks for the tip! We really need to go back and explore some more, we were on a parking time limit and another engagement we needed to go to but next time we will definitely visit Susannah Place Museum and the Rocks Museum. We were in fact so stunned to see there was an archaeological dig going on around there too! This walk showed us how much more we needed to ‘open our eyes’ when in our own city!

Yuna said:
March 17, 2014 at 10:50 am

Been there, once, but your pictures show more than i could see back then. Okeh, another nice reminder for Sydney. 😀 :D.
I love the Pancake on The Rocks. 😀

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 12:29 pm

Oh yum! Pancakes on the Rocks!!! We didn’t go there though.
Glad the photos reminded you of your time here 🙂

Yuna said:
March 18, 2014 at 11:13 am

Ah, that was the best pancake i ever had, i don’t have much preference anyway. 😀

Anna (It Started in Asia) said:
March 17, 2014 at 8:07 am

Nice one! I’m enjoying your weekend walks reviews. Love you’re wedding reception venue – that pic rocks 🙂

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 8:55 am

Thanks Anna! So thrilled to hear you are enjoying our weekend walks! We love getting out and about looking at our home state with different eyes!
LOL – we were walking past our wedding reception venue and thought ‘what the heck’ about throwing it in the mix of photos 🙂

nnhtcao said:
March 17, 2014 at 6:43 am

The city is so beautiful! I think sometimes you don’t get to appreciate the city you live in!

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 6:59 am

Completely agree – it is lots of fun to play tourist in your own backyard and ‘stumble’ across things you never noticed before 🙂

katpegimana said:
March 16, 2014 at 11:08 pm

Slainte!

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 6:15 am

And to you 😉

Aian Ramos said:
March 16, 2014 at 10:47 pm

thanks for sharing, I enjoy this ‘walk’ 🙂
Happy weekend!

wisemonkeysabroad responded:
March 17, 2014 at 6:10 am

Thank you 🙂 It was different to our usual walks – so glad you enjoyed it!!

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