We'd selected the Botanic Gardens as a targeted venue, with the possibility of calling in to the Art Gallery of New South Wales on the way back and could either walk there, looping through the southern end, or head around to Circular Quay by train, which opened up the area around the Opera House as an extra possibility. We'd been that way before, and I wasn't particularly inclined to do it again, what with the feet and all, and, in any case, if the feet became an issue I thought I'd prefer to turn back and retrace rather than attempt a beeline through unfamiliar territory.
So we walked, heading up Pitt Street as far as Martin Place, turning right and making our way down to Sydney Hospital and following the heritage buildings trail past Parliament House and the State Library to the Gardens, with a pleasant stroll that took us to the Wollemi Pine, which turned out to be remarkably small when you talk about a botanical dinosaur.
Talk dinosaur, of course, and you're bound to think of T Rex and its cousin brothers, hulking great monsters that dominate the landscape. I was half expecting something similar when it came to dinosaur-era pine trees, but of course what you're looking at when you get there is a fairly young specimen, well short of the 25 to 40 metres a fully grown specimen is supposed to reach. And, actually, it's a conifer rather than a true pine or member of the pine family, That's according to the Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wollemia) anyway.
From there, with a side trip to look out over Farm Cove, we wended our way around towards Wooloomooloo Bay, keeping to the high ground (or at least I was, Madam was free to divert if something caught the photographic eye or imagination) along Art Gallery Road towards the obvious destination.
Careful adjustments to the shoe laces along the way meant I was happy to keep going, but I wasn't inclined to spend too long wandering through the actual Gallery itself. Hughesy's not an art gallery person, and I was more inclined to access the WiFi on the premises while taking a bit of weight off the feet and catching up on things the Hilton lack of bandwidth had prevented me from accessing to date.
Back to base and a yum cha lunch