One of the best parts of doing a house exchange is walking around the neighbourhood and looking at the houses and various buildings. Woolwich is a wealthy suburb and many of the houses are older and have been well maintained.
This map shows the route.
Of course, this is a test for our hosts to identify all the photos.
The vegetation is quite lush.
Yes, we put out the blue and red bins. It's one of the curious experiences of house exchanging where bin procedures vary all round the globe.
Some of these walls are over 100 years old.
An old stone wall. I saw other 1890 to 1895 signs elsewhere.
Most Australians take a shortcut if it is available. Hence you can see a track just to the left of the tree which pedestrians have created rather than using the steps.
Somebody's foreboding driveway. Many of the old properties were subdivided with houses built behind the original houses that front the main road. Naturally, a lane was provided for access.
Trees cut back for the power wires. The cost of electricity has risen dramatically over the past decade as the government owned power generators were privatized. The NSW Government is now privatizing the poles and wires as well. To avoid paying for further price hikes, an increasing number of Australians are installing solar power with batteries in their homes.
Here is an interesting article on pay-back time for installing solar power in Oz.
Although it is winter, it's much more pleasant walking in the shade.
Interesting garage.
Sometime I will walk down there and take a look. I doubt that I will go for a swim since the water will be fairly cold.
Back entrance to a school.
The school.
I think this used to be a school but is now part of a retirement village.
You can just see the roof of this low set, presumably modern house hiding behind a high wall.
Some of the gardens are really beautiful.
I suspect many of the houses along the road were built over 100 years ago. The grounds would have been large and over the years many have been subdivided. Some houses still have extensive grounds including a tennis court which has traditionally been a popular social sport.
A very modern looking house compared to the other houses in the area.
All the courts appeared to be grass.
This has to be the most valuable footpath in Sydney. It is so wide that there would be a narrow house built there if this were the inner suburbs.
The local Church of England. It's known as the Anglican Parish of Hunters Hill.
The main path to the church. And yes, we have now changed suburbs from Woolwich to Hunters Hill.
The shopping area. Some local shops have been converted into residences.
Returned Services League for the area. This one appears to be just a small hall. However many 'rissoles' (as they are called) are large clubs that provide food, drinks and pokies.
We finally made it to the Post Office where we collected some mail for our hosts and then started to return to the house. Shortly after taking this photo, I did my good deed of the day by helping the woman on the left lift her pram up the steps.
This was the original Post Office (see below).
Housing in this area is very expensive. I was amused that the selling price of the house was 'not disclosed'. Most of the other houses for sale were also secretive about the price. If you have to ask you can't afford it.
Beautiful grass tennis courts.
We were intrigued by the flowers growing wild in the lawn. Something like our daffodils.
An unexpected decoration in such a wealthy suburb.
We finally got back to the view of the dry dock where we walked a week before.
The Harbour Bridge and City skyline in the distance.
It was a three mile walk round trip so we both got some needed exercise. In addition, I had already done a four mile walk by myself earlier in the day so I was a bit tired.
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