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...I got off the bus, and there it was!
I had such a good time in Sydney that I didn't get around to blogging from there. We arrived from Canberra on Saturday 14th and checked into our hostel, then wandered down George Street to Circular Quay. We walked around to the Opera House and managed to get booked into the last tour of the day thanks to some complimentary tickets Karina's family had given us. I am not particularly interested in opera but it is a very special building and it was interesting learning about the construction of the building. I was impressed by the main concert hall, which has the biggest organ I've ever seen. Apparently the visible pipes are just the tip of the iceberg - there are 10,154 pipes and is the world's largest mechanical tracker-action organ. I thought the seats in there were a bit pink though.
Being Saturday night, the bar outside the Opera House was pretty busy and things were lively. We got photos of the Opera House and Harbour Bridge in the gathering twilight. I found it difficult to stop taking photos of the Harbour Bridge during my time in Sydney - it is so photogenic.
On Sunday, we went off wandering separately to explore the city. I left the hostel and took a left and found myself in Chinatown. There are huge indoor markets and restaurants and things. I saw a restaurant with a load of tanks of lobsters and other seafood that I assume you could choose for yourself to eat. Then I walked past the Entertainment Centre to Tumbalong Park where there are ibises and loads of cool fountains and water features. These lead to Darling Harbour, a great pedestrianised area with a big shopping centre, a conference centre, the maritime museum, the aquarium and lots of outdoor seating areas. I returned to Darling Harbour a number of times during the rest of my week in Sydney. I sat on the edge of the harbour and watched the fish. The water is so clear and somebody was feeding them so there were a lot of them around, pretty big ones. It's a lot cheaper than the aquarium, which I didn't bother paying to go into!
Outside the Maritime Museum there's some ships you can explore. I decided on a whim to explore a destroyer, HMAS Vampire, and a submarine, HMAS Onslow. I'd never been on a submarine before and as I expected, it was very cramped. You can read more about them here http://www.anmm.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=1370 and here http://www.anmm.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=1371. It was an interesting experience and the submarine accommodation was definitely a whole lot more cramped than the hostels we've been staying in.
On Monday, we went to Taronga Zoo, a ferry ride across the harbour away. We saw loads of native animals as well as the usual zoo suspects like lions, elephants and giraffes. They had a great seal show as well and a free flight bird show. One of the big eagles decided it didn't want to play and flew off into some trees so it took a while to get it back again which was quite funny. They had cockatoos which could do the money stealing trick.
During the rest of the week I explored the Botanical Gardens, another amazing place. The sign at the entrance says "Please walk on the grass. We also welcome you to smell the roses, hug the trees, talk to the birds and picnic on the lawns." Great sign. I did most of these things! There are some great birds there, although the cockatoos are very noisy and spend their time digging up the lawns. There are loads of cacti and succulents, fountains, sculptures, flowers and huge trees. A lot of the trees have bats roosting in them - they are called grey-headed flying foxes. They are actually really cute, they have orange furry faces and they wrap their wings around them and bury their heads while trying to sleep but they seem to spend a lot of their time squarking and jabbing at each other with their wings, all while hanging upside down by one foot. Their faces do look quite fox-like so the name makes sense. Apparently there are 14,000 of them roosting there and they tend to all go in the same trees, so they are causing a lot of damage to the trees with their weight and they want to try to discourage them from roosting there and move them along.
The other thing I saw a lot of in the Botanical Gardens is joggers. The serious kind. People down this way do seem pretty keen on exercising. Huge groups of joggers in lycra make the path by the harbourside seem like an expressway. Some of them stop and do weights and press ups on the grass. There will be groups of 50 or 100 running together. Crazy stuff!
On the recommendation of the Botanical Gardens staff, I spent a few
We got the ferry over to Manly. We saw dolphins from the ferry, near the harbour mouth. For some unknown reason, a guy on the ferry brought his bagpipes and played Auld Lang Syne badly half way through the trip. No idea why they even let him on the ferry with bloody bagpipes. They're horrible things. In Manly, we walked along the beach and watched some surfers. We had lovely weather all through the time in Sydney but it wasn't quite hot enough for sunbathing in swimwear, although some people were. The sea was more wild up there, being on the actual ocean coast. We saw a pelican on the Sydney Harbour side catching and eating fish. There were lots of primary school kids on the beach playing on their way home from school. It looked like a great lifestyle, playing on a beach while a pelican swam by in the sea. When we got back, Simon got a bus overnight up the coast to Coolangatta to go diving, while I stayed a couple of extra days. That evening I got the train across the Harbour Bridge, then walked down to Luna Park (an old fashioned theme park, same as the one in Melbourne) and got a ferry back to Circular Quay, then round to Darling Harbour and had a really good curry from a takeaway in the food court, sweet potato and aubergine and mango chicken - yummy!
With my remaining time, I explored The Rocks, where the old buildings are. I saw Cadman's Cottage, the oldest building in Sydney. There's a lot of convict history around there. I explored the shops and I went back to the Botanical Gardens again.
On my final day in Sydney, I went to the Chinese Garden of Friendship, which was very nice and peaceful. They have lots of koi carp which follow you around looking for food, and some huge iguanas and some little turtles. I spent a very relaxing time there. Then I got a train at 4pm from Sydney to Brisbane, arriving at 6:30am on Saturday morning. I am too cheap to pay for a bunk or anything so I tried to sleep curled up on my seat. The train was busy a lot of the way though and the ladies behind me talking made it difficult to sleep. I still reckon it was less unpleasant than the coach would have been, which took 16 hours. The buffet car was open most of the night and was quite reasonably priced, so I could have the salad that I was craving in the middle of the night!
So that's Sydney. More to come soon about Brisbane.
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