Woolloomooloo has to be one of the best location names, it invokes a sense of fun and curiosity as to what the suburb may actually be like. Sadly there is some debate as to what the name actually means with two differing theories concluding in either a place of plenty or young black kangaroo.
This Sydney suburb is just a short distance away from the city centre and traditionally was a poorer working class district. Today, whilst there continues to be housing commission properties, it is also home to the rich and famous with Russell Crow for example owning a $14m penthouse apartment on Finger Wharf. The same wharf is the largest wooden structure in the world at 400 metres long and 63 metres wide and stands on 3,600 piles.
Woolloomooloo is also home to a great Sydney institution, a institution so popular and of world standing that people such as Frank Sinatra, Robert Mitchum, Marelene Dietrich, Kerry Packer, Richard Branson, Russell Crowe, Kevin Costner, Brook Shields, Pat Rafter, Olivia Newton-John, Jerry Lewis, Billy Crystal and Pamela Anderson have all visited. What is this institution – a theatre or government building maybe? No, a pie shop!
Harry's Cafe De Wheels
Since 1938 (with a break during the war years), Wolloomooloo has been home to the Harry’s Cafe de wheels pie shop. The name Café de Wheels’ came about as the city council of the day insisted that mobile food caravans move a minimum of 12 inches a day. Harry dutifully obeyed and thus the name was expanded to Harry’s Café de Wheels. Before the councils ruling, the caravan was known simply as ‘Harry’s’.
