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FARFRUMWURKEN
I thought this day would never come for me. I'm 62 and I'm just now getting to Australia. Many years ago I worked for a company, TNT - Thomas Nationwide Transport based in Sydney. We used to get copies of the monthly newsletter and it was always a dream of mine to get here one day. Well that day has happened.
We schlepped our bags off the Volendam this morning at 8:30. Actually very reasonable disembarkation, no lines, plenty of taxi's. We had him take us directly to our hotel - Holiday Inn Potts Point at Kings Cross. We half expected that we'd have to put our bags into security, but no - at 09:00 a.m. we had our room assigned - perfect.
We unpacked just the necessities and headed back out to explore this vibrant city. Our initial thoughts about Sydney are very good. There's alot of people here. Not sure what the population is of the Greater Sydney area, but there's people everywhere. I didn't realize that when I booked this hotel that it was situated in the "sex district". It seems there's an awful lot going on in and around the hotel, particularly at night. Who thought that Holiday Inn would position one of there properties here. Anyway all is good.
We've notice a few things right off. When people are on the escalator, they stay to the LEFT, contrary to the U.S & Canada where they stand to the right. When people walk on the sidewalks they walk according to the way they drive - again very unlike what we do in North America. There's also one hell of a lot of bars here, on every corner there's a local little gin joint.
We first thought we'd get on the HOP-ON/HOP-OFF bus here and take their two routes just to get a flavour of the town. It's usually the way we start off in a new city, you just seem to get more oriented quickly so that you can either get on local transport (bus) or walk with some degree of confidence. I'll tell you, because we raced out of the hotel - we didn't put on sun-screen, we didn't put on hats and after 2 1/2 hours on the HO/HO bus - open top deck, we baked. We made our way back to the room and got lathered up and headed back out on the Bondi Beach circuit.
Overall it's a pretty good deal for $30.00 AUD each and it's good for 24-hours.
After that we got off the HO/HO and headed for the Sydney Tower - the tallest structure in the city. Up we went to the observation deck and got some shots of areas surrounding the tower. It was a clear day so we thought that it would be best if we took advantage of the good weather.
We'll be back at it tomorrow with plans for lunch with Charles and Marie and then maybe down to the Circular Quay, The Rocks and Darling Harbour so that we can get a tour of the harbour, it's been recommended as one of the things to do.
We schlepped our bags off the Volendam this morning at 8:30. Actually very reasonable disembarkation, no lines, plenty of taxi's. We had him take us directly to our hotel - Holiday Inn Potts Point at Kings Cross. We half expected that we'd have to put our bags into security, but no - at 09:00 a.m. we had our room assigned - perfect.
We unpacked just the necessities and headed back out to explore this vibrant city. Our initial thoughts about Sydney are very good. There's alot of people here. Not sure what the population is of the Greater Sydney area, but there's people everywhere. I didn't realize that when I booked this hotel that it was situated in the "sex district". It seems there's an awful lot going on in and around the hotel, particularly at night. Who thought that Holiday Inn would position one of there properties here. Anyway all is good.
We've notice a few things right off. When people are on the escalator, they stay to the LEFT, contrary to the U.S & Canada where they stand to the right. When people walk on the sidewalks they walk according to the way they drive - again very unlike what we do in North America. There's also one hell of a lot of bars here, on every corner there's a local little gin joint.
We first thought we'd get on the HOP-ON/HOP-OFF bus here and take their two routes just to get a flavour of the town. It's usually the way we start off in a new city, you just seem to get more oriented quickly so that you can either get on local transport (bus) or walk with some degree of confidence. I'll tell you, because we raced out of the hotel - we didn't put on sun-screen, we didn't put on hats and after 2 1/2 hours on the HO/HO bus - open top deck, we baked. We made our way back to the room and got lathered up and headed back out on the Bondi Beach circuit.
Overall it's a pretty good deal for $30.00 AUD each and it's good for 24-hours.
After that we got off the HO/HO and headed for the Sydney Tower - the tallest structure in the city. Up we went to the observation deck and got some shots of areas surrounding the tower. It was a clear day so we thought that it would be best if we took advantage of the good weather.
We'll be back at it tomorrow with plans for lunch with Charles and Marie and then maybe down to the Circular Quay, The Rocks and Darling Harbour so that we can get a tour of the harbour, it's been recommended as one of the things to do.
- comments
mike nichols Congratulations Bob Finally madeAus. Sounds like a great trip so far.