Kristine Carroll did the only shade on the beach – a triangle thrown by a makeshift rescuer station – and a hot sunscreen on all freckled skin.
Winning in the burning southern sun, she checked out her 8-year-old daughter Zoe, who without hesitation fell into blue-green water. “She is a water child,” Carroll said.
The Pacific Ocean, which supplies Sydney in Australia, the iconic shoreline and the most enviable beaches in the world, was almost 50 miles. The pelican capsule swam next to it, and near the coots wandering, without the sea sea. The sign openly warned about the wave heights of two millimeters – lower than one tenth inch.
This is the Pondi beach.
No, not bondi, shiny background Reality TelevisionThings from the dreams of backpacks and the land of Zero Australian browsing and sand-but Pondi, when the locals took a humble, artificial PenRith beach.
Created on one section of lagoons in a former quarry at the foot of the blue mountains, which mean the western fringe of Sydney, Pondi, pronounced pond-oko, will not be exactly worthy of a postcard like the title Bondi beach. But she became a welcome marinade for many who live an hour or more inland from the coast and pay huge fees for reaching.
Like many cities, the fringes of the urban stretches of Sydney consist of working class families, newly arrived immigrants and other people pushed out farther from the city center, rising prices of apartments. In Penrith and nearby areas, this also means life with temperatures 30 degrees Fahrenheit higher than near the coast, which is a discrepancy tightened by climate change. In 2020, Penrith was short The hottest place on earthWhen the mercury reached 120 degrees.
The beach was opened to the second season in December and thus far it cost the state government around $ 2.7 million. Just over half a mile it’s so long as the Bondi beach.
Last Sunday, when the heat warning with a height of 95 degrees, children splend down in Pondi with pondi with tubes or swimmers in the shape of crocodile and unicorn. Some families threw themselves on the ball of rugby, while others cooked the feast of shrimp, sausage and all roasted chicken. Several girls lay on the stomach on a tan.
46 -year -old Mrs. Carroll, a resident of Penrith, who works as a coordinator of education in a close-by prison, never had air-con at home. Last night, she said, she only drove a automobile for air-con, since it was too hot in her house.
Having a beach near her house, in order that her family could cool off, as an alternative of spending all day by going out on the coast-paying high prices for the side of the road, parking and food-she was an amazing help, especially in the crisis of the cost of living, which, she said, she prolonged her funds. Thanks to her accounting, the trip that day would cost her gas for a 12-minute ride and a 50-percent McDonald’s ice cream for her daughter on her way home.
“Many people raise their nose on it, but my friend, it’s free. They think it’s Goddess Fake the Bondi beach, “she said, using an offensive Australian slang for the person, historically related to the western suburbs of Sydney.
Zoe said she was in “Real Bondi” last weekend to fulfill his cousin. She liked it, but she said that the salty ocean water left her with red spots on the skin.
“I like how soft the sand is. In Bondi, the sand was too hot,” she said, sticking to the feet in the pale sand of Pondi.
After playing in the water, Elhadi Dahia and his three children – aged 6, 4 and 1 ½ – approached the grassy slope to 2 trucks with food. Two older ones polished hot dogs and a potato snack and started to beg ice cream. The youngest was in a swimming diaper with the words “Fish are friends.”
Driving from Darfur in West Sudan, Mr. Dahia said that he only knows find out how to “swim a donkey”, growing up in rivers flooded after rain. He said that he got here to Australia over ten years ago as a refugee and that he enrolled his children for swimming lessons for real education in Australia.
That day they were late for swimming classes and as an alternative decided to go to Pondi, which his neighbor was delighted for weeks. 38 -year -old Dahia said he was pleasantly surprised and said he would probably come back.
Diana Harvey said she was skeptical about Penrith Beach before she decided to envision it under the influence of whim on the last afternoon on weekdays.
She needed a break from her duties as a full-time guardian for her autistic adult son who keeps her at home for many days, and was not on the beach all summer-parody for a lot of Australians who consider swimming the right of birth.
“I basically grew up in the water,” said 52 -year -old Mrs. Harvey, remembering that her family would spend three hours driving to the beach and growing up. “We are all aquatic people here.”
During the summer years, she jumped through Pondi, pondering that she would make a fast, 20-minute drop, but ended with swimming for 2 hours, blue mountains majestically stretched out and the expansive azure sky reflecting on calm waters.
Some residents wondered if the beach thus far could be essential Glorified swampAnd there have been transient closures of problems related to the quality of water. The Opening Week of Pondi in 2023 was destroyed by a tragedy when a person who floated on the paddle board with young children behind the play drowned.
According to the state government, over 200,000 people visited the beach in the first season.
Last weekend, the Barbara Dunn family was the first in the queue, before the gates to the beach opened at 10 am, her 6-year-old daughter Rhythm jumped out of pleasure of the rear window of the automobile.
“Where are we in New Zealand, we would call it a lake,” said 45 -year -old Mrs. Dunn. “This is a task. You’re wet, right?”
The rhythm was limited by sand with a plastic bucket crammed with tools for constructing sand locks. For the next six hours, when the hot sun reached the peak over the head, after which began to go to the mountains, when the crowds were filled, after which tirelessly swam, played in the sand, rolled up on the grass of the river.
“She won’t want to go home,” Mrs. Dunn said with a sigh.
