Arrived in Sydney Town and headed straight to St James in King Street, yes as in St James Church via St James Station. For anyone not into Camino. The whole purpose of the Caminos in Europe is to walk to Santiago de Compostella. This is where St James one of Jesus’s 12 Disciples is buried. Long story short St James son of Zebedee followed Jesus along with his brother John. After the crucifixion St James headed off to Judea on a pilgrimage unfortunately he was beheaded by King Herod. His followers returned his body to Spain once this became known Pilgrims started walking the way of St James for all sorts of reasons. St James is the Patron Saint of Spain and all Pilgrims.

I felt any Australian Pilgrimage needed an element of St James. In Sydney there is a service every day at 12:30 this is a beautiful church designed by Francis Greenway the first stone laid in 1819 and is Sydney’s oldest surviving church. I had seen a photograph of the sculpture of a man laying and covered in cloth at St James but to see it for real was moving, religious or not the person below the cloth could be any man, especially at the moment with so many becoming homeless with the fires. It took my breath away.

After the 30 min service one of the congregation members turned to me “we usually go for coffee” so off I went with an Octogenarian and a man who I was convinced was from nearby Parliament for coffee. Such a Camino like thing to do. We chatted for an hour or so and went on our way, humans can be awesome. About St James Church Sydney

I headed to the Art Gallery of NSW checked out the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Gallery as well as some of the early colonial art can’t say I found one favourite painting but I did love these baskets.

From the gallery I headed to the Botanical Gardens to see my favourite tree it fell over in 2008 when it was about 100 years old but is still soldiering on today. It’s a Dragon Blood Tree from the Canary Islands in Spain. In the wild they can live for 650 years. Dragon Tree Story

Making my way around to Circular Quay past the Opera House I caught the new Light Rail up to Central to check in for my overnight train ride to Melbourne.

I had booked a sleeper and was lucky enough to have the cabin to myself. I haven’t slept on a train before and can’t say I got much sleep the XPT is 40 years old, it shakes rattles and rolls a bit like my dancing, just when I dozed off a new twist in the line and I was awake again. Still very comfortable and wonderful to lay back and watch the sun rise over some (very dry ) farmland as we left NSW. Breakfast is bought to you and there is a buffet car but nothing like you see on Murder on the Orient Express. No power to charge a device or wifi, I did have a shower in the smallest shower and toilet cubicle, great to be refreshed though when I got off the train at Southern Cross in Melbourne.

After some real coffee and finding they have an excellent bag hold service at Southern Cross, I’m off without my backpack to explore. First stop St James, not open unfortunately but it has an excellent water feature. Founded 1839.

From here I walk to the Botanical Gardens to do an Aboriginal Cultural Tour. The gardens are spectacular and well worth a wander. With no charged phone I couldn’t take any pictures. An interesting group on the tour more Danes than an ABBA concert.

Back to Southern Cross to collect my backpack and then checked into the hostel, time for a Nana Nap and managed to grab a bottom bunk. Happy Dance!

Next adventure, I head down to Federation Square and visit the Koorie Heritage Trust, an excellent art and artefact collection and a walk through Birrarung Marr on the banks of the river.

This is the land of the Wurundjeri people.

And a perfect place to rest before heading

back to the hostel.

Distance Traveled 924KM

Distance Walked 27KM

Bag Rustlers 1

Snoring incidents 0