Oceanic Cafe

A recent "discovery" for me is the Oceanic Cafe in Surry Hills near Central railway station in Sydney, Australia. This place was recommended to me by a few of my fellow workers as a place to get very cheap, old fashioned home style meals.

This cafe has been here almost unchanged since the 1930's. Not only is the interior decor from the 30's but so is the menu and the old lady who runs the place (along with her daughter) is said to have been there since then!

About the most expensive item on the menu, lamb chops at $9! All the meals at the Oceanic are served with hand cut potato chips, onions, peas and two slices of white bread with butter provided on a little silver dish. No fancy spices or "jus" here, if you want extra flavour, that's what the salt and pepper shakers are for!

In a world of too many choices and exotic variety, I found this a refreshing change. Just good, simple and very tasty food that fills you up without weighing you down or emptying your pockets. Food from yesteryear with prices to match.

The entire menu at the Oceanic Cafe. All seven items. There is only one choice of cold drink, a can of Coke. Hot drink choice is tea or coffee. No latte, flat white, cappuccino, espresso or any other fancy muck.

The Oceanic is a little leftover slice of a Sydney that has long gone. I'll be back again very soon for another delicious trip back in time!

The Oceanic Cafe is at 312 Elizabeth Street, Sydney, Australia.

New Model Railway Arrivals

Welcome to my blog.

My main interest in life has always been railways, both real and in model form although I will be posting about my other interests too.

My first post celebrates the arrival of three steam locomotive models for my model railway. I've been waiting for these for a few years now and they finally arrived yesterday!

The picture above is 3801, which is probably the most well known steam engine in Australia. The real one is currently undergoing a major overhaul which includes an entire new boiler.

My model however, will never need a new boiler but does have a sound chip built into it with all the various sound effects you would expect from a steam locomotive. The model is seen standing at the main station on my HO scale model railway, Byron Creek which is of course what I named my blog after.

This is 3803, which has the same streamlining of 3801 but in an all over black scheme with rather striking red lining as it would have appeared in the 1960's. Unfortunately, trying to photograph a very black object is not too successful. This model will need some"weathering" applied to it so it will look more realistic and photograph better.

And finally, we have 3813 which is a normal non-streamlined locomotive. This is in a rather nice green colour scheme as it would have been in the 1960's and is my favourite out of the three models at the moment. All three locomotives are members of the C38 class which were originally designed as express mainline passenger locomotives, but could often be seen hauling goods trains.