Salam.
The second day of our family vacation was spent in Newcastle. Before we reached Newcastle from Sydney, my parents-in-law were already excited to see our house, the house we’ve been living in for the past 9 months.
Well, I can say that there’s nothing much to see in Newcastle, compared to Sydney. We planned to go see the beaches Newcastle offers, perform Friday prayers at the Newcastle Mosque, visit University of Newcastle and do some shopping at Glendale.
Table of Contents / Kandungan
Newcastle Beach
My wife prepared Nasi Lemak with Sambal Udang in the morning. We then went to the Newcastle Beach and had our Nasi Lemak there by the beach. After that, we strolled along the beach towards the Newcastle Ocean Baths.
We also showed our family how Newcastle city looks like with most of the old buildings still existing. Here the town is small and quiet, unlike Sydney which is densely concentrated with skyscrapers in its CBD.
Newcastle Mosque
As it was Friday, all males should go to the mosque. I went to the mosque in Wallsend together with my in-laws for Friday prayer. As usual, the khutbah was in Arabic and English with multi-ethnicity of Muslims in the prayer hall.
Stockland Glendale
This is the third stop for today. My parents in-law who are a big fan of juicy fruits were really excited to go to Harris Farm Markets to buy fresh and cheap fruits and vegetables there. We got a good bargain of bananas for only 99cents perkilo which is cheaper and tastier compared to the bananas at Woolies or Coles.
Then we toured the other shops at Stockland Glendale and went to Kmart and Target and browsed through their Christmas sale.
University of Newcastle
I guess it is a must to visit the university here for some photo souvenir. This is where my wife is studying architecture at the moment, the university within the woods.
Well, that’s all for the second day. It is another great day well spent with the family. The following day was going to be a big day for us as we were going for a road trip to Gold Coast.
Day 3 – Road trip to Gold Coast
It was my first time driving for the longest distance so far. It is about 700 km from Newcastle to Gold Coast. Our destination was Currumbin, near to Gold Coast Airport.
We departed at about 9am and we arrived about 5pm. It was a 9-hour journey but to my surprise, Queensland did not observe Daylight Saving Time and that was why when we reached there, it seemed like it was only an 8-hour journey.
We checked in at Sanctuary Beach Resort and had a good rest preparing ourselves for the next fun-filled days in Gold Coast.
To be continued in the next post.