Manly scenic walk and swim

Walking and swimming 5 times on my birthday was the order of the day today! I did not expect it to be so hot and humid here. It’s 29/30 degrees with varying degrees of humidity! We set off after picking up a picnic first to include my favourite fruit - cherries and raspberries, and a juicy apple. We followed the signs towards Manly Spit around the scenic headland with fantastic views. The whole walk was only about 6 miles but it felt longer, with steps and rough boulder walking in parts, inbetween easy walking on wooden slats. Some parts were waterlogged Sandy paths alongside burned trees, and my favourite tree was the giant bottlebrush tree which was more like a toilet brush tree! There were a few mad people running part of the stretch in the heat with some parts quite exposed to the sun. We stopped at Forty Basket Beach for me to swim in the sea in the fenced off area. Showers and changing rooms are at every beach here! Next we stopped at Reef bay where I swam again. The final beach was down steps to Castle rock beach, where I swam twice! An ice cream boat rocked up so we were able to replenish our water ( and Adrian to eat ice cream).
After paddling along Clontarf, which was back in civilisation, we had a cup of tea, then walked back to Sue’s via lots of steps up hill and over roads with posh houses.
On our return Sue was about to go out for a swim after work so I joined her for my 5th swim, walking down to Fairlite beach about 15 minutes away on foot.
In the evening we walked into Manly ( 30 minutes) to an Italian restaurant called where I ate delicious olives, and puttanesca on fresh casarecce pasta which was absolutely fabulously tasty washed down with a bottle of wine shared with Sue.