Manly Beach and North Head, Sydney

 Manly Beach and North Head, Sydney

It was back to the Circular Quay to take a catamaran fast ferry to Manly Wharf.

And the ferry passes the opera house...

...and Mrs Macquarie's Point...

...and passes close to Fort Denison. When I was so close, I could see that it really is small so I was less disappointed in not seeing it...

...and looking back...

...and past a series of main channel marker...

The skyline of Manly as we approached.

                                        

One of the older traditional ferries which were in the same livery but slower.

                                        

The harbour was clean and had a sandy shore.

But just across the isthmus between the mainland and North Head on which the town centre sits is another batch facing the Pacific and there are more waves but it is safe to swim here. I am told that locals prefer this beach to Bondi which is more crowded and touristy. A view looking south.

A view looking north with shade trees along the promenade.

I left the town centre and walked up the hill towards North Head. There are some great houses and institutions along the way. And then I was into the Sydney Harbour National Park. It is a park that includes some Second World War gun emplacements, a range of barrack buildings and a former Quarantine Station that is now partly a museum and partly an operational hotel

The road entrance to the park / army camp.

The entrance to the barracks.

The parade ground surrounded by more buildings.

Having walked up the hill to get to the park, I now walked down through part of the former quarantine station and past parts that operated as a hotel. A range used as hotel bedrooms.

Another range of bedrooms with a verandah.

Down on the docks at water level are the museum buildings. Inside a dormitory where people were first housed on arrival.

One of the storage rooms.

One of the other visitors to the museum's cafe.

A building housing autoclaves that disinfected peoples luggage before they were allowed any further into the quarantine station.

One of the many dockside buildings.

There is a road connection with a shuttle bus that you can call but the phone was out of order. This is the former funicular railway from the docks up to the rest of the station which has been converted into a staircase but I lost count of the number of steps somewhere after a hundred and still had some way to climb.

The powerhouse and chimney looking back fro the steps.

There were various lookouts around the site but this one was the least obscured by vegetation looking across buildings used by the hotel to the harbour.

Back at the top of the hill it was a few kilometres walk to the gun emplacements. This was a former anti-aircraft emplacement.

The two guns were large and had a range of 28 kilometres.

Gun Emplacement No 1 and it wasn't in a good state f repair.

Gun Emplacement No 2 was better maintained although the gun had been removed.

An information board showing the internal and underground actions, none of which were open to the public.

Some of the surrounding rooms with locked doors used for the crews, storage and ammunition.

The entrance to an underground bunker but again, it was locked with no access for the public. All the time that I was there, except for the hotel, museum and car parks, if you walked 100 metres away, there was not a soul about but the hilly terrain and distances to walk in the heat would put most people off.

Looking back at the dockside facilities of the quarantine station and the chimney of the power house clearly visible and some of the buildings at the top of the cliffs.