Today's post is our first foray into Sydney's Outer West. If you like suburbia then you'll love...
Woodbine
Woodwhere? I'd never heard of it either.
It turns out Woodbine is a suburb which has been carved out of neighbouring Campbelltown. Today, I was fortunate to have a car to take me here.
Passing the "welcome" sign, I took a right to explore the northeastern corner of the suburb.
Despite this Western Sydney summer's day pushing the temperature into the high 30s, I thought it would be best to park the car and take a stroll to see what Woodbine has to offer.
This end of the suburb is full of modest, one-story family homes from the late 20th century.
Even though Woodbine is a good 40km from the nearest beach, the locals don't seem to find it a problem. To prove this, they've named almost all the streets in the suburb after beaches.
Here's Collaroy and Avoca. Other streets in the suburb include Cronulla, Curl Curl, Terrigal and Maroubra. This is riveting stuff, people.
Underwhelmed by Woodbine so far, I set my next goal to visit a park named Jackson at the northeast tip of the suburb.
To get there, I continued passing through the same sort of inoffensive family homes,
a slightly unusual alleyway,
and some very wide suburban streets.
I'm not sure what I was expecting, but a big wide area to play sport is about as standard a result as any.
Melting in the searing heat, I had to make my way back to the air conditioned car.
Along the way, I passed an alarming number of abandoned toys.
There was this severely scarred green superhero thing,
a couple boxes of terrifying soft toys,
and the car I arrived in.
Once I made it back to the car, I headed to the "other side" of the suburb (what my life would've been had I turned left at the "welcome" sign).
I was expecting this side of the suburb to look exactly the same, but alas, not so.
West Woodbinites like their houses larger, with most of the homes on this side of the suburb having an extra storey, a more generous number of pillars and more manicured lawns.
If I didn't know any better, I would've thought I was in Sydney's Hills District, rather than Campbelltown.
Bonus glamour shot of the GoGet car I rented for the day.
I thought I had seen both sides of Woodbine and was ready to call it, but then I stumbled on a third.
This is Woodbine Neighbourhood Store and feels a little more Country NSW than Hills District or Western Sydney.
This country feeling is only heightened by the nature reserve across the road.
A crest on the road brought me back to reality though, with sweeping views of endless suburbia.
On the other side of the crest is the western border of Woodbine. I kept driving onto my next suburb.
Woodbine: This is a suburb that hasn't worked out what it wants to be yet. There is zero reason to come here.
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