QVB Tea Room

Categories: friends, ship-of-fools, food

Date: 12 March 2006 10:44:11

An absolutely wonderful afternoon in an absolutely wonderful place: the Tea Room at the QVB.

The QVB -- Queen Victoria Building -- is an absolutely exquisite building, completed in 1898, almost demolished in the late 1950s [Sydney likes to get rid of its old buildings]; and restored from 1984 to 1986. It now houses shops and cafés, and it a very pleasant place to walk around. One of the people I had tea with assures me the Ladies' Toilets are quite opulent also. This photo gives you an idea of the inside, and this shows you the outside.

The Tea Room is in what was once a ballroom, and the renovations have it keeping a very charming and elegant feel. The menu challenges the Lent-following among us, and I do confess to a failure. With the two shipmates I went with, we ordered Afternoon Tea: cakes, pastries, sandwiches and scones, served on a triple-decker serving implement. I went for the Earl Grey tea and was not disappointed. It was great to see the shipmates again, including one from Brisbane, and wonderful to have my first visit tio the QVB Tea Room.

It was a weekend of shipmates. A shipmate now living in the Solomon Islands also is in Sydney and visited our parish for Vespers Saturday evening: please pray for him as he recovers from an operation and prepares to return to the Solomon's.