Summer in Sydney means ... Lego stuck in tarmac and birds’ property disputes

What does a Sydney summer mean to you?

Leaving work while it’s still light. Getting home to watch dusk from the deck. Flocks of cockatoos wheel around Annandale valley yelling at the magpies who are disputing ownership of a eucalypt with the lorikeets. It wouldn’t be Sydney without a heated discussion about property and the birds clearly understand this.

Sydney’s property war is also fought in the trees. Credit:

Earliest memory of summer in Sydney?

It was a blindingly hot day and the tarmac on the kerb outside our place in Gladesville melted. I was about three-and-a-half and therefore had a lunch box filled with Lego with me at all times. I remember using a stick to push a piece of Lego into the glistening black sludge until the plastic cube was completely submerged. As far as I know, it’s still there.

First place you take visitors?

It’s hard to top catching the ferry to Taronga Zoo. Giraffes, sun bears, meerkats – what’s more Australian than that? But I do have mixed feelings about keeping wild animals in cages. In my view, they should be allowed to roam freely in Mosman.

Giraffes aren’t Australia’s best ambassadors, but Taronga Zoo does show off the city. Credit:

Favourite cafe?

I’m usually a Nescafe Blend 43 type of guy so adjust your expectations accordingly, but on Saturday mornings we like to go to Store, a cafe facing Camperdown Park. I urge you to try the Moroccan scrambled eggs. The staff kindly bring your order out into the park, so you can take your time with a breakfast picnic under the shady trees.

Secret Sydney spot you escape to?

We’re a city of secret parks. My favourite is a couple of streets away in Forest Lodge in one of those unregarded sandstone gullies where the ground is too rough to build on. This one is called Orphan School Creek playground. There’s a sandpit full of donated toys, a patch of grass and a winding path down to a creek. I call it the Dragon Forest because it looks like the sort of place they might live.

The best summer food is …

Yum cha at East Village in Zetland on the way home from a morning at Little Bay beach.

I know it’s summer when I smell …

Petrichor, the scent that rises from dry ground just as raindrops start to fall.

My favourite summer song is …

I’ll go with Once in a Lifetime by Talking Heads, a song about not living your life on autopilot.

The worst thing about summer is …

Asymmetric, low-intensity warfare with mosquitos.

My closest bolthole to escape the city is …

A clifftop walk in the Royal National Park, down to Eagle Head Rock and back, ending with fish and chips at the Bundeena Community and Services Club.

Guilty pleasure?

I can, and frequently do, walk past world-class gelaterias to get a plain old soft serve choc top from the van at Jubilee Park in Glebe.

What aspect of summer life would you change, and what do you want to always stay the same?

We need trains to all the main beaches. We’re a fragmented city, physically and socially, so let’s knit it together with better, simpler public transport. This would have the added bonus of annoying the NIMBYs. One thing we must retain is the native wildlife that still hops, shuffles and swoops around the city, so let’s keep our greenery and nurture more. Sydney belongs to the possums, pademelons and powerful owls as much as it does to us. I’ll make an exception for the mozzies.

Summer in Sydney is a series where Herald staff reveal the best – and worst – of our city in the hotter months.

A cultural guide to going out and loving your city. Sign up to our Culture Fix newsletter here.