At Camden, we didn’t do much. We walked around the town

We also walked Miss Llewella Davies Pioneer Walkway. It was fun for Uma as it was a farm and she saw lots of animals.

We drove a Kia Carnival. It was very comfortable car though it feels like a bus to drive. The drive in in itself was fun and I also got to drive a bit in Australia.

The platypus track is the smallest one at Bidjigal Reserve. We chose it so Uma could walk. The weather was good, and she was in a good mood.

The track is covered with trees. It’s cool and comfortable for a walk. It has water and a variety of plants and birds on the side to keep kids interested.

She walked half the way, then announced that she was tired, needed a break, and a snack. Sat down, ate her snack, then rested for another five minutes before continuing.

There were some steep climbs for her. She asked me to help her there and carry her. Maybe a hundred meters in total. After that, she took a break every 300 meters, either sitting and watching or playing with water, but she walked on her own.

In total, she walked 3.3 km in about two hours. She was surprisingly cheerful after the completion, though a bit tired. As a treat for her first full-fledged walk, we all went to a local ice-cream store and got gelatos. She loves the chocolate flavor.

As soon as we landed in the center, we looked for a good coffee place, and found Diggy Doo’s Coffee on Sathya’s list. It was also close to where he worked as well. I messaged him. We got to meet him and have some good coffee, and only then we started our actual walk.

The first place to visit was, of course, Hyde Park. I am kind of reminded again and again why all great cities have big parks in their centers. How much they add to the character of the city. Hyde Park in Sydney is one such. It’s beautiful. You can spend a lot of time just roaming around. Since it is also very close to water, it becomes much more attractive.

At Sydney Opera House, Uma was in great mood, so we took lots of pictures of her doing various things. She loved the open space, cool breeze and the waters.

We didn’t realize we had walked so much until we got tired at the end, and I looked at the GPSLogger. Uma loves walking, and she walked at least one-third of it, so it was fun. She was also in a good mood to pose for photos, so we took lots of pictures this time.

• The holidays are going well. We got to celebrate Uma’s birthday with family. Uma enjoyed visiting all the animals she loves.
• Uma loves bus rides. So we took buses everywhere. We walked around the city, Hyde Park, and the Opera House this week. We also met Sathya for coffee. Thanks to weekly notes we know quite a few things happening in each others life. So it was like continuing a conversation we recently had. It was good to see you, Sathya.
• Today, she got to go around the farm picking strawberries. We do have a strawberry plant at home, which she is very fond of. Today she saw hundreds of them and picked many. I also got to drive on nice roads along the Hawkesbury River and ate some great pies. I will write more about that later.
• I have been using SSH keys to encrypt and, in some cases, to sign. It’s the most practical solution, as most of my team members already have SSH keys to sign in to git or a Linux server.
• No workouts or play this week. I have to make up once I am back in Bengaluru.

She saw Koala, Dingo, Wombat, Kangaroo, and Kookaburra from the book. She loved all them and also the bus ride to the park.  Here are some short videos from the visit.

• On Saturday, I was at IndieWebClub/BLR meetup. I could help some folks with WordPress. Other than that, it was just fun to see and listen to so many bloggers. Beautiful Bangalore flowers.
• It’s the season of birthdays; we celebrated a couple this week, and we will celebrate more next week. Sunday was Echos gotcha day. It’s already been five years. Time flies, and he is a senior now. Anju baked a cake for him and for Pathu.
• I also met some friends for coffee and dinner during the week, but we couldn’t play. I was able to do two days of training at Stairs. I am progressing well.
• Dave Winer and Kotke have blogrolls that might interest you. 404Media is one of the tech media I follow. I am not a paid subscriber yet, but one day I might. I use uv everyday. The company behind it, Astral, is joining OpenAI, which I think is not good news for uv users. But let’s see. If your kids are forced to be online for entertainment, then The Kid Should See This is a curated list of videos that you might find useful. In fact, even for adults. Nightingale looks like a great tool for creating karaoke songs. It’s FOSS as well. I have not tried it yet.
• I thought courts would take a strong stance on Sonam Wangchuk’s illegal detention for 170 days. But I think I failed to realize that the S.C. doesn’t work in isolation; they are just part of this society, and they fail citizens just as other institutions do.
• If I am forced to define what I like to do in three words, then it would be to learn, build, and teach.

• It’s been hot and dry in Bengaluru. It’s been raining also, not a lot, but just enough to cool down a bit. I hope it continues. We have started using AC for roughly an hour every day. Just to cool the room before we go to sleep.
• I played a game of pickleball with friends on Sunday morning. Now that seems like an ideal time for everyone. I also do two P.T sessions this week. I have started noting down the strength levels. Whenever I cross a milestone, I will try to add a record there.
• I wrote about my new hydration backpack. It’s been very useful. I hope to use it more.
• NMG/2026 application period is over. We have received 285 applications in total. I have started going over them slowly.
• Sathya has a map of cafes and restaurants in Sydney. I have been following and adding some of them to my TODO list. But this listing is very useful. List of public spaces across India to run all kinds of community events. It’s an FOSS and Open Data project. Instagram users have lost E2EE. I am not surprised. Instagram is just an advertising platform now and wants every signal. The next step for Meta would be WhatsApp. It seems like whatever progress we (India) had made in terms of transgender rights is regressing.
• There are lots of interesting things happening in the world of ActivityPub worth noting. Madblog exposes a bunch of Markdown files as a blog with full support for ActivityPub federation. It looks very easy to set up and run. Pubby is a Python library to manage everything related to the ActivityPub protocol. It makes it easy to bring AP to your Python applications. ap cli client is, as the name suggests, a command-line client to your AP server. And the most interesting one is holos.social, where you run the ActivityPub server on your phone (keys on the phone) and then expose it to the world through relay servers. Relay servers act as a middleman between your phone and the world. It also supports custom domains.

Note: This was written yesterday. But I forgot to post.

Requirements

• Comfortable to wear the whole day
• Good quality build
• Big enough to hold enough water, phone, wallet, power bank, snacks, and maybe a multitool or additional pair of gloves based on need.
• Ability to use it outside riding, say, while on a day hike or city walk.
• Affordable

Solution

After quite a bit of research, I had the Navigator Hydration Backpack from Rynox, the Marine Neo Hydration Pack from ViaTerra, the Kreiga Trail 9, and the Wildcat 12L by Moskto Moto on the list. Both Kreiga and Wildcat are great on paper. But I think it’s too expensive ( > INR 20K) to buy without trying first. I will have to find a friend to try them out first. Marine Moto comes at a great price (INR 3399) and includes a hydration bladder. I found its minimal approach to being just a hydration backpack appealing. I wanted something more. So finally, I settled on the Navigator Hydration Backpack by Rynox.

Things I like

• Total bag capacity is 4 Ltr. It’s not big, but it’s not very small either. I did buy a separate 2L hydration bladder (it can hold up to 3L). Depending on the situation, I fill 1L or 1.5L.
• The water stays in the main compartment near the back; it’s quite stable. This compartment also has drainage holes. There are holes for the sipper; you can make it come out on the right or left side, as you prefer. This compartment can be fully opened for easy access, thanks to an all-around zipper. If you just add 1 L of water, you can easily fit a pair of additional gloves and some snacks. This also gives full access to adjust the shoulder harness so you can fit it nicely on your back. The main compartment also has a semi-transparent (plastic) pouch on the closing flap. Works well for a wallet or snacks, etc.
• On the outside, there are two zipped pockets. One is deep. It can fit a power bank, phone, or camera. It is quite deep. There is a second zipped pocket; it’s not very deep, but it can still hold my phone and wallet together.
• On the outside, there is an elastic cord-based compression storage. It has molle-like webbings for accessories as well. You can put your gloves, wet socks, etc., here. You can also attach accessories to webbings, though I don’t like it. I do have an LED blinker and a reflector clip that I attach here. However, I can use the Vioo Clip at the bottom for it.
• The bag is sturdy and holds its shape. I also like how the back is designed for comfort and air circulation with enough sturdy foam. The backpack straps range from small to large, using the G-hooks from the main compartment. You can also make smaller adjustments outside using the straps. They have a Sternum Chest lock for effective load distribution, which I love. They have a standard waist strap. It is very comfortable to wear.
• The build quality is good. It has YKK zippers, and I don’t think they have made any major compromises there.

Things to think about

• Maybe a tidy bit bigger, 7 ot 9 Liters would have made it a bit more than the hydration backpack.
• It doesn’t come with a hydration bladder. I think it’s always a good idea to sell them together.
• At Rs. 5050 (3550 + 1500), it’s not cheap. I know it’s not as expensive as some foreign brands, but it is still expensive for many. But for the quality, I am okay to pay, I think. Only time will tell.

Conclusion

I have used it on the Big Loop, a 700 km single-day ride. I carried about 1L of water, Insta Go2, a Wallet, spare gloves, and a multitool. It was very comfortable. I didn’t feel much throughout the ride. Though I didn’t drink as much on the go (I would often forget), I think it’s a matter of practice. It was also easy to remove it and wear it. No fuss. It also fits well over my riding jacket. Zips were also accessible while wearing gloves—all in all, positive.