Wine Tour & 1st Sydney Trip: Gay Mardi Gras

Early morning... and long day. Wine tour started at 9am and took us to five vineyards and cheese/fudge tasting places as well. Most of us left the first vineyard more than a little buzzed and all ended up eating every last piece of complimentary food they had out for guests, oops! I believe our first wine tasting guide ended up a little wasted as well - for some reason, we keep hearing that when people have us around they always end up getting way more wasted than planned. I guess our group has that effect on people - even old men on the job. I discovered a new obsession with desert wine, something that I don't believe is offered in the U.S.? Or maybe it's just Kansas, which wouldn't surprise me either. I also saw my first kangaroos while driving (riding) in Hunter Valley from vineyard to vineyard. I scored a free bottle of desert wine from one of the vineyards so even after the terrible wine hangover that set in by 5pm, it was a successful day.

That weekend was the gay Mardi Gras parade in Sydney. After seeing all the hype from Real World, it would be almost a sin not to check it out - ....or should it be the other way around? Either way... we headed to the store beforehand to grab some PB&J's & boxed wine for the weekend - we're not kidding around with saving money. ..And when I say we "headed to the store" I really mean.. we walked 20 minutes. In the middle of our walk.. it starts monsoon raining, to the point it hurts to stand in it. We finally end up having to call a cab, which could barely make it through the roads that had flooded after only 10 minutes of rain. The water was literally mid-shin. Upon entering the cab he tells us not to get the seats wet - umm.. sorry buddy.

On to Sydney - after about a 2.5 hour train ride, we finally made it. We were staying with one of my roommates cousins who is studying at the Uni there and unfortunately had a long walk to his apartment with our luggage, in the rain (again). Upon walking in we realized what conditions we were going to be in for the weekend. We expected a typical apartment, but their room was comparable to the size of my dorm room freshman year with a couch that is more like a barstool. And there was five girls staying there for the weekend all sharing one bathroom and a 5x5 sleeping area of concrete with cloth over it. We headed to Side Bar that night and had a pretty low key evening.. except for the paparazzi there. For some reason, when the four of us girls walked in we kept getting weird looks from people. I think I can count three or four different people that were taking pictures of us. One guy even went to the extent to stick the camera in front of my face when I was walking by and snapped pictures. They must have thought we resembled someone famous from the states .. crazy Aussies.

The next morning was our touristy day. We started off by walking to Darling Harbour and saw the Real World House, had lunch at a bar on the Harbour, and went to the Sydney Aquarium. We then went shopping and found a 4 floor Supre (one of my favorite stores in Australia). Then we went to the Sydney Tower and on the Oztrek (a virtual ride through OZ). We headed to Chinatown that night for dinner... not impressed with the Chinese here. Most of the food here has a lot less flavor (but is also a lot healthier). Ten of the 11 roommates were in Sydney for the weekend so we all met up that night to go out. One of the girls prevented us from getting in to bars because she was so wasted - they are ridiculously strict about this. We head to another bar... walk in thinking it's huge and try to go to the opposite end. After getting about halfway down, we ask people standing in our way to move... and realize it is a mirror making it look so big! That was embarrassing - especially being targeted as the dumb Americans - and that happened more than once among our group of roommates. I couldn't handle the atmosphere so after a couple different suggestions we head to Hugo's in Kings Cross, a pretty upper class club. On the way there, our group gets split up. After going to the ATM, Hannah and I finally make it to Hugo's, and nobody else from our group is there. After being hit on by a midget while waiting and a drink later we find out our roommates got confused and ended up going into the bar underneath Hugo's. They walked in, immediately ordered drinks and turned around to see strippers on the poles. They weren't about to waste the expensive drink so they finished it and jetted. Kings Cross is the red light district in Sydney - where prostitution is legal.. it's just really "dodgy" to say the least, which explains the strip club in the middle of nice bars.

The drinks at Hugo's were pretty expensive... like $15 bucks a drink. I finally just tell the bartender it's my friend Shannon's birthday to get her a free shot. You could tell he had gotten this before - so being skeptical, he went along with our plan. He asks for her ID to prove it, and not thinking - she gives it to him - even though her birthday was in January. We somehow work our story out and he gives her a huge straight tequila shot.. watches her take it and suffer, and refuses to give her a chaser. Gotta do what you gotta do. We then meet a group of guys from Gold Coast and get open bar for the remainder of the night so it was a success. At the end of the night we go to get a cab home - pretty easy, right? WRONG. Cabs in Australia are not required to give people rides. Almost any time we would walk up to a cab, and try to talk to them through their windows, they'd start speeding off! After running around for 20 minutes and almost getting run over by several different cabs, we finally get a cab home. The driver then decides to get lost and we end up with a fare much higher than expected - but what can you do. Home to our comfortable bed... the concrete floor - with bath towels for blankets... that's when you know you aren't high maintenance

The next day is the Mardi Gras Parade themed Brave New World. We hit up a $10 dinner place, yep - budget savvy once again. We hit Oxford Street (where the parade took place) and it was the most insane crowd I've ever seen. I believe there was an estimated 1 million people attending this parade. I would go ahead and guess that half were Asian. This detered any idea we had previously had about going to Thailand for break... we could NOT take being swamped by them like we were. We brought a couple water bottles of wine, squeezed up to the 2nd row and, even though it's not my scene, we had a great time watching for a few hours. Upon leaving, we all got split up into pairs (luckily nobody got pulled apart and left alone) but all met at Darling Harbour. We went to Strikers Bar first, a pretty nice bar with a bowling alley in the back and then headed to Cargo Bar (where Real World frequented). There was a long long line at Cargo but we managed to blend in to the front of the line and worked our way in - and up to VIP. The next day, while walking to leave, we got approached by a homeless woman insisting us to go to The Hilton because Keanu Reeves is in town and she is just sure we can meet him if we go. Only in Australia.

First weekend in Sydney - a good run.. and definitely not the last.

Aussie Song: Ida Corr and Fedde Le Grand - Let me think about it