Morning on Sydney Road, Brunswick

These photos were taken at 8.50am near Blyth Street on Sydney Road.



It takes me about an hour travelling to get to my two day a week job in Brunswick. During that time I have moved to a very different part of the city

It’s an area of Melbourne I didn’t know and I find that life lived here is very different from life lived in the Bayside suburbs.

There’s the lack of the beach of course. But that wasn’t the first thing I noticed. On my first morning I left in plenty of time to negotiate the traffic and I arrived rather early at the top of Royal Parade. Great, I thought. I’ll have a coffee and read the paper. I drove along Sydney Road only to find it shut. I’m talking here about 8.20am. There were no people about and no cafes open. I found a news agent that was really a tobacconist. He had a whole wall of cigarettes and huge area of fancy lighters and amongst this two copies of The Age, one rather battered so I bought the other one.

I parked near the office to listen to the radio and read the paper. Opposite me was a medical centre. It wasn’t open either but there were 7 people queued up outside. One elderly man kept looking through the front window while another held forth on some topic and every now and again a couple of the women laughed with him and made a comment. A youngish man learned against the wall and pretended he was the only one waiting there.

It was curious. None of these people looked particularly sick and they couldn’t all have had an appointment at the same time. Yet you would hardly think the centre would operate on a first come first served basis. They were still there when I left and their numbers had swollen with the addition of a stocky middle aged woman.

By lunch time the area has come alive. The pavement is crowded. All the shops are open. The lines in the Post Office and the banks are long and the cafes are open and full.
There is a great place for sushi rolls and there’s a great café in Victoria Street that I plan to visit again.


















This is the place to buy your Wedding Dress. The shops are everywhere and the designs stunning.

I have never seen so many fabric shops so if you are a dressmaker this is the area to be. It is also the area for a bargain. Two Dollar shops and Variety Bargain shops are everywhere. See my previous post for my wonderful find.

I’ll be back there next week so I will explore further.