Today my wife took Scully to work, so I had the entire morning free. I decided to leave early and catch the train and bus to Bondi Beach, and then do the Bondi to Coogee Walk along the coast. I took the new Metro train to Martin Place and changed to a regular train to Bondi Junction, and then hopped on a bus to the beach.
I arrived there before 9am and the weather was fine and mild, with the forecast maximum of 22°C. I began the walk at the southern end of Bondi Beach. Here’s the view looking north back to the beach.
Heading south, the first major sight is the Bondi Icebergs swimming club, with its ocean pools.
The waves sometimes crash spectacularly over these pools, but the ocean wasn’t too rough today.
Rounding the Icebergs, there’s a view looking back north over the pool to Bondi Beach.
From here the path south follows a fairly new track with boardwalks built in the last decade or two. I’ve never done this new walking path before!
The path head south around a rocky headland called McKenzies Point.
Here there are sandstone cliffs overlooking the ocean, undercut by the waves.
Around the point we can see the next couple of inlets in the coast, with Tamarama Beach (hidden) and Bronte Beach (left).
There were bunches of surfers in the rough water near Tamarama. Tamarama is the roughest and most dangerous beach in Sydney because of the geography of the bay.
Tamarama Beach itself looks like this. It’s tiny.
Rounding the next headland we get a good look at Bronte Beach. Bigger and safer for swimming. Although the sea is still a little rough today after some heavy weather over the weekend.
Circling around the beach to the south side, we find Bronte Baths. Unlike the Icebergs Club, this pool is free for anyone to use.
A wider view.
The new walking track isn’t very well signposted. I followed what I thought was the track around the pool, only to find a dead end. So I had to track back and take a set of stairs up to another path above. On the way I took this photo of the pool from the southern end.
Eventually I found the correct path and continued south past Bronte. Here’s a panorama looking back to the north.
The next sight is Waverly Cemetery, the cemetery with the best view in all of Australia. A new boardwalk takes walkers along the cliff below the cemetery. Walkers here used to have to walk through the cemetery, which annoyed the local council.
It’s a historical and very picturesque cemetery. In fact I saw a group of three guys in there filming something.
Here’s the view looking back north once past the cemetery.
The next beach is Clovelly, which is a tiny beach in a very deep, sheltered bay. Unlike Tamarama, here the long cove calms the waters so much that there were toddlers splashing in the water.
There’s another free public pool here too.
Next along the coast is Gordons Bay, which has a tiny beach, but mostly used for launching boats, not for swimming.
And around this next small headland is our destination, Coogee Beach.
The beach has this cool rainbow decoration on the main central steps down to the sand. It wasn’t far from here that I spotted one of my neighbours, walking his dog! I said hello and he was surprised to see me too. He’d dropped his partner off at some work thing nearby and was walking their dog along the beach while waiting to take her home again afterwards.
I ended my walk at a cafe in Coogee, The Little Kitchen. I had the chorizo and chick pea shakshuka, which was delicious. They also had muffins, which turned out to be strawberry and chocolate, in the one muffin! I had one of those too as a dessert (but forgot to take a photo of it).
After a relaxing meal, I caught a bus back to Bondi Junction, where I stopped to look around the shops for a bit. I timed my departure to arrive back at North Sydney on the Metro in time to pick up Scully from my wife’s work. And then I had to walk her all the way back home from there! I spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing after a busy day…
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