Out and about

On Friday (the first day of the weekend) we went to Marina Drive, about 30 minutes away, for brunch. There's an art/craft market there which was interesting for me to see. It was not dissimilar in quality to Nelson work. No ceramics, but paintings, jewellery, clothing and bits and pieces. The area has a number of high-rise apartments and lots of hotel towers, 50 in just one complex. The boats in the marina are expensive motorboats. All very swanky and a nice place to hang out. There are loads of restaurants there and we had a really good Japanese meal.

Marina Walk market

On Saturday I taxied into The Creek area and spent time wandering around the museum (better than I expected), art galleries, art cafes, and souks/markets. I found a good Indian vegetarian restaurant and had a standard, but good and cheap, lunch.

I crossed over The Creek in an abra, ferry (cost about 30c). They go continuously and hold about 20 people and there are dozens of them on the go at any one time - it takes about 10 minutes from one side to the other. The other side is interesting - the boats dock here and load/unload. They are lovely wooden boats, painted in bright colours. There are lots of markets, including the gold souk on that side. I wasn't looking to buy anything, but had a really nice time wandering around. Then I abra'd back and checked out the textile souk and looked for somewhere to eat, but couldn't find anywhere that had another female in it and it was dark by then so I taxied home with a Formula One driver who talked very loudly and at length to several women for the entire, scary, 40 minutes. It makes driving myself seem like a good option.