Sydney: Newtown
One of our last days in Sydney fell on the Fourth of July, which is one of my favorite holidays. Obviously we couldn’t celebrate it in our traditional ways, so we decided to take the bus to Newtown, a southwest suburb of Sydney. We didn’t quite know what to do there except for a coffee shop we wanted to try, so we started our morning at Brewtown, reading our books and figuring out what to do next.
Nick really wanted to try Grumpy Donuts because it was recommended as one of the best donuts in Sydney! It was quite a walk across town to get there but the weather was nice so we didn’t mind. When we got there, we were surprised by all of the options! There were a ton of vegan donuts, but Nick went with the blueberry crunch. There was also a display of homemade gluten free oreo-type cookies (two soft, chocolate cookies with cream in the middle) so I got the nutella cream flavor! Everything was delicious!
We wandered around some more and checked out a record store, some vintage shops, and a bookstore. We heard Newtown described as “bohemian”, which is the perfect word to describe all of the shops.
We were just waiting for lunchtime because we were so excited to try Lentil as Anything. This was one of the first restaurants we heard of when we were researching Sydney and we love their mission. The whole restaurant runs on a “pay as you feel” system to encourage social fairness. All of the staff are volunteers, including the chefs. The entire restaurant is vegan and gluten free and it was some of the best food that we had! We loved supporting this business!
Because we wanted to spend the whole day in Newtown, we decided to go the movie theater. Toy Story 4 was out and we both wanted to see it so we got tickets for a later time, and hung out around the town until it was time. The movie theater had the fanciest lounge area but the actual theater was pretty standard. Apparently they do a lot of events and film festivals but unfortunately, we only experienced a regular movie. It was still fun though!
To finish our “fourth of July”, we wanted to eat some good old American burgers and fries. Of course, being gluten free and vegan, it’s always so hard to find options for me! On the main street, there were so many different burger places so we decided to check out the menus until we found something for me. Surprise, surprise! We found 5 all-vegan burger places on one street! Nick was actually the one struggling to find something with meat. We decided on Soul Burger, which was delicious, before we caught the bus and went home.
- Jess