Night Noodle Markets!

As good as it sounds.

During the month of October Sydney holds it's fine foods festival, otherwise known as Crave Festival-- where almost every night/weekend there is some amazing food event happening. From Breakfast (Brekkie)on the bridge to special menus at restaurants, to fiestas and beer festivals.

This week and last have been focused on the Night Noodle Markets in Hyde Park (right in the main business district in Sydney) from 6-9:30pm the park is filled with food booths focused on Asia/Pacific cuisine along with matching entertainment and decor. Hundreds of tables sat below strings of "fairy lights" (white Christmas lights) and strings of red and multi-colored lanterns.

The group I went with decided the best way to attack the noodle markets was everyone go to a different booth and order 2 or 3 things and we would reconvene and share at our table (along with a few Aussie beers of course) So from calamari to garlic prawns, pad thai, chicken satay, red and yellow curries, dim sum, and turkish gozleme, we touched several parts of the world through our stomachs.

After dinner we walked through the park where listened to a guitarist play everything from Metallica to flamanco-style music as we walked through the open air art exhibition--where local photographs were displayed amongst the trees on huge canvases.

From the food to the art, I cant think of a better Tuesday night in Sydney.

Labour (yup with a 'u') Day Weekend: Hawkesbury River

Although I missed out on Labor Day weekend at home, I more than made up for it with Australia's Labour day weekend! (yup the Aussies spell it with a 'u')

I was invited to go houseboating on the Hawkesbury River, which is about an hour and a half north-west of Sydney city. The theme would be Woodstock anniversary, 10 girls, and lots of food and booze. Nothing better than hot weather and houseboating with a group of girlfriends, right?....Enter RAIN...and LOTS OF IT! The weekend forecast was decidedly a wet one.

We decided not to let a little rain get in the way of a great weekend. And because of the crappy weather most of the houseboats sat unrented, which allowed us to upgrade for quite a cheap fee! Now with our new huge boat we set sail along the river. Although it was storming, we spent a lot of time dancing outside on the deck doing what anyone else would do, rain dances. Days were lazy and filled with celebrity mags, girl talk, boy talk, board games, booze, bbq, and lots of dancing and laughing. Nights were filled with pretty much the same, lots of beer, wine and pre-teen girl games (hilarious to play now)

Our final day, the rain dances seemed to pay off and we had a beautiful sunny day, we bbq'd--finished the rest of the wine, and ate our lunch together on the top deck of our boat in the hot spring sun. Couldn't have asked for a better finish to the trip.