Day 39

Start:  Sydney Harbour

Finish:  Sydney Harbour

Distance:  0

Total:  628

Today has been a great day off. Resupply and recharge were the goal for the day and both were accomplished. 

I slept in until 8:00 this morning, then lazed around and got the day started in earnest at 9:00. My official duty for the day was to find a place to buy some new shoes. Ever since I started these long walks back in 2015, I have worn the exact same shoe; Merrell Moab low top trail shoes.  In the U.S. you can buy them in any sports equipment store, and from a zillion sources online. They’re not expensive and last just as long as high priced shoes. With 628 miles on my current pair, they’re at the end of their useful life. So I needed to find a store that carried my shoes. After doing some research I discovered there was a very large shopping mall just under a mile’s walking distance from my hotel. The mall had an Athlete’s Foot store along with some other stores I needed to visit. So off I went walking to the mall, and lucky me, they had exactly the shoes I needed. Even though they were almost double the price I pay in the U.S., I had to have them so I got my shoe needs filled along with a few other supplies I had run out of. 

After returning back to my hotel, I started working on some motel reservations for the next couple of weeks down the road. I have been having a recurring problem over the last week with PINK.  Not the color pink; the entertainer Pink. I’ll explain. On Feb 12 & 13 I am scheduled to be in Newcastle. Newcastle is a city of 350,000 about a weeks walking distance north of Sydney. I was planning to be to Newcastle on 12 Feb, and have my next day off there on 13 Feb. So about a week ago I started calling hotels in Newcastle to make reservations for those two nights. The first three places I tried were national brands with toll free reservations numbers so I wasn’t actually talking to someone at the local Newcastle hotels.  After being told by three different hotel reservation attendants that 12 Feb was available but 13 Feb was booked up, but they didn’t know why, that I decided to call directly to one of the hotels to get the lowdown. That’s when I was told PINK was in Newcastle on 13 Feb for a concert and I wouldn’t find anything available for that night in town. Oh good golly!  Of all things. I don’t know Pink; don’t listen to Pink; can’t imagine why she calls herself Pink; but I did see a segment on 60-Minutes recently about her and she seemed nice enough. So Pink is standing between me and a day off in Newcastle, New South Wales; and Pink has won. I gave up after over a week of calling about cancellations to no avail and moved my day off to a new town down the road. 

Tomorrow I start the second half of this trek with a heavy pack, take the train to downtown Sydney, and pickup my route from there. My first task will be to walk across the Sydney Harbour Bridge. From there I head up the coastline north of Sydney for 37 more days. I’ll be to Brisbane on 15 March. Wish me luck!  JB.