Prison Blues: Parklea

If you're like me, you'll read the title of this post and say "oh cool, he'll visit Parklea Markets." Well, it turns out that Parklea Markets are not in Parklea at all. Let's find out what is here.

Parklea

Parklea is a Northwest Sydney suburb, sitting halfway between Blacktown and The Hills. My visit to Parklea was spurred purely out of convenience, as a quick opportunity to check off a small suburb while I ran an errand in the area. This meant that my visit was by car today, which was handy considering the ominous rain clouds forming overhead.

So if not markets, what does Parklea actually hold? Mainly near-new McMansiony type houses.

This seemed to be the case whichever street I chose.

Hehe.

The map showed that this small suburb features an unrepresentatively large park, so having looked at enough of the Jones' houses, that was my next destination.

This is Davison Reserve.

It's a large piece of grass, 

with some trees on it,

a few paths,

a kid's playground,

and a dry creek (this visit was before the intense storms we've been getting in Sydney). 

A nice enough place if you're local, but I wouldn't exactly travel for it. The locals seemingly don't care much for it though, judging by the ghosttown that the park was (although I suppose the clouds overhead could've scared everyone off). 

Other than the houses and park, Parklea does have one thing.

Parklea Correctional Centre, a men's minimum and maximum security prison.

As you might imagine, I didn't head in to take a few happy snaps lest I be forced to join the local populace, but I did capture some pictures of the road in.

Of particular interest to me were the signs before you enter,

where you're presented with the entire Crimes Act to peruse as you drive your car in.

Satisfied that I'd seen everything there is to see in this plucky suburb, I continued on with my day.

Parklea: Flashy houses; shame about the neighbours.