Back to me as Amy is still sleeping and I got up ages ago and I am bored, sorry!!

Our flight from NZ to Sydney left at 6am so of course it was yet another very early morning for us. We said our very sad goodbyes and I really wanted to stay home, but we had to go. The flight wasnt interesting and we arrived in Sydney around 8am. I have to say SYdney is one of the worst airports I have ever been to, there was no organisation at all with where you have to go for customs, and then once you come out there are no maps of the airport or any information places or even many signs pointing to buses this way etc. So once we battled through the massive crowds we managed to get a shuttle into town.

I say massive crowds because it happenend to be World Youth Day in Sydney right when we were there and they expected 500,000 people for the event. This is sponsored by the Cathloic church (kind of a recuriting drive thing) so of course the Pope was there. This changed our plans a litlle.

We were able to check into the hostel by 10am and then we went out for a day of adventure. Our hostel was very close to the CBD so everything was in walking distance. We visited Darling Harbour (a nice area of outdoor cafes and shops), Sydney Harbour bridge, the Opera house, the botanical gardens, NSW parliament. Again we had massive sticker shock at how expensive everything was. I have seen all theses sights before, so what was exciting for me for the day was trying to navigate through all the closed streets and barracades that had been set up for the Pope. It was about 60 degrees so not to bad. The Opera house was partially shut down for the WYD activities, but we could still walk around it. It is massive, and most people dont know that there are two main rooms to it, so the picture that you see above on the right side there is another shell shape that is exactly the same as the one you see next to it.

Of course everywhere we went there were thousands of others, but we enjoyed the walk around town. We got back to the hostel around 5pm and had a nap and then showered. At 6pm the hostel had free wine and cheese for an hour so we indulged in that and meet a couple fellow travelers. This was located on the roof top of the hostel which had a great view of the city at night. Right in front of us was the National Cathloic church where the Pope was going to be staying the next night. Of ourse it was on shut down with hundreds of police and army guys around the outer baracades that had been put up.

Thursday we got up early and went to Circular quay where the main ferry, train, and bus station is. We bought day passes and we where going to bead to Bondi beach via a ferry but that didnt leave for ages so we caught a bus. Bondi is Sydneys most famous beach and it is only about 10kms out of the city center. So we walked around the beach and there were of course a lot of surfers in the water. Then there is a nice walk south atop the cliff fronts, it has a great view of the surf and rocks below. We came across 3 surfers how where surfing in a cove with no beach (so therefore huge sharp rocks were the beach). These guys were crazy as they went so close to all the surrounding rocks and when the wiped out I was sure they were going to hit there heads on the rocks that you could clearly see under the shallow parts, but somehow they didnt.

Then we bused back into town and the hostel and picked up some more clothes as it wasnt the warmest of days. Then we walked into a nearby park that we knew we would be able to see the boata-cade and moto-cade when they came by during the afternoon. Amy was worried as half a million people were expected but I wasnt too worried as there are a lot of places to see him, but we went early. We ended up getting great seats on the point with an awesome view of the harbour bridge and opera house. So we sat here for a few hours as we waited for the Pope to come by in his boat. In the end it was in a huge boat with thousands of people in it so you really couldnt tell if he was there or not, but Amy swears she saw one guiy dressed in white.

Then we walked back into the park and found a good spot to see the moto-cade. There was really no one around so we talked to a couple of cops about how so many Aussies think that they have certain rights when being arrested because of American TV and movies. Also they said that people curse them out here and they imagine in the states the cops wouldnt take that. Anyway we waited for another couple of hours and to be honest there werent many people around. Finally the moto-cade came and I videoed it on the camera as they were driving so fast. So we saw him but I wasnt impressed as how looked totally unimpressed with the people around and dis-interested with being there. He didnt even look at us, he was looking across the road (where nobody was aloud to go) at the tress and fence. But Amy said he is 81 and it had been a long day for him so I accepted that to a point. I just thought a look or smile would of been nice for all the people who had waited 5 hours to see him. I heard in some places there were 50 people deep on the fences, where we were there were not even one in most spots.

After that we caught the ferry to Manly, oh on the walk there we saw hundreds of bishops posing in photos with all sorts of poeple in the streets. We did also so the high up ones who had a police escort to there etremely fancy hotel. The whole attitude in the air was so friendly and positive, the WYD made it a great trip to Sydney. Anyway back to Manly, the ferry is a great ride as you get some good photos of Sydney at night with all the famous sights. Manly is a nice suburb with a great florida like beach and some cute shops. We stayed for just over an hour and had some food. Then back on the ferry to town and back to the hostel to pack up and get some sleep.

We left the hostel yesteday at about 6am to get to the airport and then got the 14 hour flight to Johannesburg. Let me tell you it felt like the longest flight ever as it was day time the whole way and the flight left at 10am Syndey time and arrived at midnight Sydney time, so of course I didnt feel tired during the flight at all. I ened up watching 6 or 7 movies as I had nothing else to do. We arrived safely and with no problems.

Now we are in Johannesburg and Woodys parents house. But I need to go wake everyone up now, more later.