Let's Go Fly a Kite

Let's see, where did we leave off? We did eventually motivate for a walk Saturday night, in time for a beautiful sunset over Watson's Bay and then a pretty cold rainstorm before we made it home. We had enough time to dry off and get into warm clothes before heading out with Sharon and Ben (Mark's sister and brother-in-law) and Greg (Mark's brother; Karen, Greg's wife, was not able to get a babysitter in time) for dinner at a Mexican restaurant in Bondi Beach. (Yeah, Mexican in Australia. Who knew!) The food at Mojito's was actually not bad, although you pay $8 for chips and dip and you get a decent-sized bowl of chips with teeny-weeny little bowls of dip. Dining out is not cheap here! After a couple pitchers of sangria, we walked off our meal along the "boardwalk" at Bondi. I was practically a zombie by the end of the evening (more jet lag?), and promptly fell asleep once we got home.


Good thing too, as I had to get my beauty rest before Sunday morning's festivities: family photo time! For once, Mark and I were the best behaved of the bunch, sitting and posing without any squirming, fidgeting, or whining. In the end, all our little nieces and nephews shaped up, and I think the photographer was able to get some nice shots.

A little later in the day, Ben and Sharon called, inviting us to see the Kite Festival at Bondi Beach. When we first arrived, there was barely any wind. But the kids were entertained with face painting and whirly-cup rides. As we stood in line waiting to get Ariel and Lily on the bungy-jumping trampoline ride, the wind picked up and suddenly the sky was filled with kites of every shape and size. It was kind of freaky to turn around and see hundreds of kites just hovering overhead, like a swarm of oversized, multicolored insects.



With the wind came cooler weather, so we warmed up with a cup of coffee as we watched Ariel and Lily (who had patiently stood in line for nearly half an hour) jump on the bungy jumping thing. (Truth be told, it was Ben and Ariel who stood in line, while Lily ran around getting her face painted, etc., with Molly and Sharon.)

After another ride on the whirly-cup ride, Ben and Sharon headed off to visit friends, and we ventured to Surry Hills for sushi (finally!). But, alas, most restaurants here in Sydney are closed in the afternoon and the sushi place wasn't even open on Sundays. Boo hoo. So, instead, we walked most of the neighborhood, which is on the verge of switching from a fairly dodgy section of Sydney suburbs to the hip new place to be, and wound up eating doner kebab sandwiches (lamb) at a little take-away Turkish restaurant. Quite tasty.

This morning we woke up at 6 a.m. to catch the ESPN production of the 2007 World Rafting Championships from Korea. We hadn't seen even a second of footage from the race. It was actually a decent production, with a couple good interviews with Mark! Now Alan is off playing tennis (oddly enough, after waking up at 2 a.m. each morning to watch most of the U.S. open, he and his mates did not reschedule their weekly tennis game in order to watch the finals), and Molly is about to go to the gym.

Mark and I don't have any plans for the day, although there is not a hint of a rain in the sky, so we might walk toward Sydney along the harbOUr and see if we can find a good spot for fish and chips. Yum!