Sydney - Darling Harbour

We arrived just before New Year's Eve and went for an explore in the scorching sun. We were staying in an apartment hotel near Darling Harbour so that is where we started.

Darling Harbour is a busy place, ringed with dozens of bars, restaurants and cafes. There are shops, hotels, exhibition halls, modern architecture, the National Maritime Museum. There were street performers and a great atmosphere.

The ubiquitous Sydney Harbour ferries. They were great - went everywhere!

Huge liners littered the Harbour. I counted 6 or 7 there on New Year's Eve. Not my cup of tea.

We watched the faded New Year's Eve flags lining the entire Harbour be replaced by fresh Australia Day flags a few days later.

I loved the hustle and bustle of the place.

So, back to to gloomy, foggy old Bradwell. I had a good day in the office yesterday. A strawberry smoothie for breakfast, sushi and a pear for lunch and a banana on my way to the gym. Yes, you heard right, a good solid workout before I got home so I would not be distracted away from exercise by my pesky chimp.

It worked and I was looking forward to supper which was a quick and simple soy scallop and prawn stir fry. Yum.

Today I've been at home which I find easier. My golf was cancelled again due to rain and flooding so I worked for a bit until I felt hungry then had scrambled eggs with a rasher of bacon (should be avocado but - yuck) and mushrooms and tomatoes. It was almost too filling. I was a tad stuffed afterwards.

It certainly kept me going through an hour's hilly walk round the village.

Not quite as sunny as Darling Harbour eh?

I swear there is a large farmhouse up there!

For supper I branched out to Tom Kerridge's diet book with chicken biryani. The calories are kept low by substituting more than half of the rice with grated cauliflower. I've not tried this although have obviously heard of it so I was interested to see how it worked out. Especially as I was giving Rich exactly the same dish...

It was great. Rich had no idea it was cauli rice and I couldn't tell either. I don't know whether 100% cauli rice would be any good but I'm certainly willing to give it a try. I suspect the mix'n'match approach is the way to go.

I will definitely cook that recipe again too although I would add more spice. It was much more filling than I expected too and I followed the recipe to the letter.