The day after the day after Christmas day: Birchgrove to Balmain walk I

What does one do on an overcast day after the madness of Christmas and Boxing day? Compile Hottest 100 lists whilst watching the ‘excitement’ of the cricket test unfold on TV and endlessly clicking refresh on the Sydney to Hobart yacht tracker (just me? Oh…)? Or hit the shops to glare at/elbow fellow bargain hunters in the $5 bin at Hipster?
The answer: a bit of all of the above, unless one is feeling particularly masochistic and chooses to spend the afternoon braving the steep inclines and relentless trendiness of Balmain whilst looking utterly washed up as a result of over-indulgence in Christmas cheer.

And so our family set off for what our trusty “Sydney’s Best Harbour and Coastal Walks” book (2nd edition), informed us would be a 8km loop of about 3 hours duration, taking in the surrounds of Balmain and Birchgrove.

We subtracted 1 hour from this estimate on account of the Sheriff, little tortoise and myself’s speed-walking, then added hour back on account of the Heart Patient’s glacial pace and our collective propensity to stop every few metres to take photos of what normal people would consider banal scenes (see below for Exhibit A), consume food and drink (mainly food) and of course, search endlessly for public toilets.

Exhibit A: I managed to make the beautiful Mort Bay (not a promising name; literally ‘Death’ in Latin) look completely boring. Probably to the delight of the locals, sick of keen-bean bushwalkers like us spoiling their afternoon by taking pictures of them socialising their dogs (see exhibit B) or taking their children on spontaneous fishing expeditions (exhibit C).

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

Exhibit C:

Getting there
The book suggests the romantic option of a ferry ride to East Balmain, or the less romantic option of a bus ride from the city. We opted for the least romantic option (in addition to being anathema to the bicycling/vespa riding population of Balmain), by driving. If you do drive, the hot tip is: don’t be council-coffer enrichers like us, and park in the sections of Darling street close to the shops because these are likely to be metered. Instead go further up, close to the cross streets where the walk starts, as even though you will still be limited to 2 hours (all the best with finishing the walk in that time!), you don’t have to pay. Or, as a kind, hipster couple informed us (after we had bought a parking ticket, but the thought was there), there are some shops with unlimited parking behind them.

Terrain
The book had this walk down as ‘Easy’ which I presume means a-just-learnt-to-walk-6-month-old-could-breeze-through-this-so-stop-complaining. However, the prevalence of steep stairs (see below photo for just a taste) throughout seems to contradict this and the Heart Patient nearly threw in the towel after enduring a few of these (I should note that I probably added to the stair-quotient by misreading the map a few times). HP did eventually continue, after aiming a few murderous stares (no pun intended) in my direction.

It is also worth noting that this is a very exposed walk; barring a few shaded sections, it was completely open to the elements. Therefore, unless you do the walk in winter, it is best to choose an overcast day and attempt it in the afternoon or early morning – and despite doing so, I managed to get a slight tan from when the sun showed its face for a mere half an hour.

Notable features


Views! Vistas! Panoramas! Scenic sights! There was so much to take in ; on land and on the harbour that even the lady behind 52 suburbs (who I’ve borrowed some photos from; let’s face it, she had warm gooey light on the day she visited, plus a slightly superior camera) couldn’t help reverting to postcard clichés. History alongside modern marvels; industrial grit alongside trendy gentrification. Beautiful Parks with jaw dropping bridge(s) (Anzac and Harbour) views, clever installations (+not so artistic photo-taking of said installations on my behalf), oddly named yachts, Islands (Cockatoo and Goat). Intricately latticed Federation homes. Oh and a shipwright’s cottage (near cnr of Cooper and Darling St). Swoon.

My only gripe is that the walk skirts around the foreshore of Balmain and Birchgrove, meaning that we missed out on exploring the interior, which is just as interesting, with some of the oldest and most majestic churches in Sydney (if you look across from the train when crossing the Harbour bridge, you’ll see the elegant spire of the Anglican church pointing to the Heavens and you’ll know what I mean), the boutiques and quaint pubs and good ol’ Unity Hall where the Labor Party originated, back when Balmain was a working class ‘burb. Oh well, excuse for a repeat visit I suppose!

Sustenance

This can be found in the form of delightful cafes and restaurants galore lining Darling St, or in our case, several chunky choc-cononut cookies (1 for 50c), sold to us a barefooted 10 year local entrepreneur, who had set up a rickety table on the footpath. They were good, and by good I mean there wasn’t even a crumb left.

There is also a grungy, madalt Woolworths, featuring exposed ceiling beams in a 19th century building.


...see part 2 for the Route
C.L.