AusTour 14: Sydney: the Complete Review

(Sydney gets its own review post)

I did like Sydney. Like I mentioned in my first post on Sydney I was excited when I got there and this excitement carried through for the most part. I do, however, feel like I missed a lot of Sydney somehow. What we got in this trip to Sydney was the tourist experience. And we did it up proper. the see Sydney cards were really a blessing and a curse—get in easily, but have so much to do you don’t know what to do with yourself. In all it went too fast really, I would really have loved some more time to slow things down and take things at a slower pace rather than cram everything in. It will be something I will have to return to do at some point later as I feel like there was a lot of culture and life to Sydney that we missed. Also shoving it on the end of such a long trip down the east coast did it no justice either, by that point I was pretty exhausted…and it only continued on into Adelaide.

AusTour 13: Sydney Day Four

Day four dawned, and with it our last day in Sydney. After checking out and leaving our luggage with the hostel (what we had been doing the entire trip on the days we left when our departure was later in the day). We made our way down to darling harbour again where we had booked a ride on Sydney Jet. Sydney Jet was like the harbour cruise two days before. except that is was in a high speed jet boat, fish tailing and spinning etc. after donning fairly large ponchos we realized we might actually get wet on this ride. That was kind of an understatement; the guy who sat behind us might have been swimming at one point. Oh, and STOLEN PICTURE. Reasonably wet, we found some well prices fish and chips and dried off in the intermittent sun (typical as it was beautiful the day before). Following that we went to the National Maritime Museum which was on the opposite side of the harbour. We got entrance to the two ships they have with our See Sydney Cards—a submarine and a destroyer-type ship. The submarine was pretty fascinating, and I managed to do a classic door-swing through one of the portholes. The war ship was good, but I was extremely confused when the lights went off and it began simulating an attack sequence. The actual museum had some pretty cool stuff in it, included a temporary exhibit about toy boats to which there was a curious short film in French with toy-ship characters playing. Bizarre. With time running short we headed back to the hostel to retrieve our bags and through the end of rush hour headed to the airport. The trip there was hindered by one stick—that although the airport is in the transport system it requires a separate ticket to exit/enter the airport. After failing to find the source of a meat pie topped with mash potatoes in the airport and settling on Hungry Jacks for dinner again, Barry departed for Melbourne and I to Adelaide for more adventures around Australia.

AusTour 12: Sydney Day Three

Over exhausted and possibly with a mild case of heat exhaustion the next day dawned. The good news was it was going to be a nice day again—in fact it was going to hit 30 degrees centigrade. Our first stop was 2 hours on bicycles around Manly. Manly is a short ferry ride (one of Sydney’s 11 ferries named after the 11 ships in the first fleet to come to Australia in 1787—thanks Rocks tour!). In fact most of the locations outside Sydney are accessible by ferry either run by Sydney Ferries or the faster HabourCat’s. Manly is decidedly a beach culture; a thin strip is bordered on both sides by beaches and is a popular destination for Sydney day trippers. I should mention that it took us a good amount of time, a tour of Manly’s Ocean World (mucho insignificant compared to the Sydney aquarium we had seen the night before), a conversation with an old lady and a trip to the visitor centre before we actually found the bike place. There was no hassle to rent the bikes though and we made our way out along a suggested route by the bike shop man (a web designer/marketing student in uni…sounds vaguely familiar…). This route though was uphill most of the way, and by the time we got the top of the hill it was about time to go back down hill. After some creative directions by myself we got a quick tour of most of the city streets in Manly and visit to the beaches on both sides. After the ferry ride back from manly we made some impromptu decisions after missing the next schedule attractions (Barry’s fault for getting the location wrong) and got on the ferry to Darling Harbour. Essentially there are two sides to Sydney, the main harbour or circular quay where the Rocks, Opera House and Bridge are, and the secondary harbour (darling harbour) home of star city, plenty of clubs and restaurants, the aquarium, the national maritime museum and our next attraction Wildlife World.

Wildlife World is essentially the home of all critters Australian in Sydney (possibly apart from Tonga Zoo). Kangaroos, wallabies, spiders, snakes, koala’s, birds, and nocturnal’s (fact: there are more animals active at night in Australia than at day) etc. following Wildlife World we had some down time (thank god) before a night-time observatory tour at 830. The one hindrance to this was we needed to eat, and no where was open/ or even existed. It was absurd how we could be walking for 45 mins straight without passing a single restaurant open on a Sunday night. We would eventually settle for hungry jacks—fast food yum!

The observatory started with a free walk through the museum part of the observatory with some of the old telescopes and time keepers. There were some really fascinating objects in its collection but before we had time to see it all we were rounded up for a look at the stars. The observatory has two telescopes. The first was an old-fashioned one, hand adjusted through which we looked at Jupiter rising into the sky. The second was a more high-tech computer adjusted telescope which allowed us to see the double star that’s part of the Southern Cross. It was in this dome enclosure we found that the acoustics were just right now hear the person directly across from (even if they were whispering) you as if they were standing just behind you. It was bizarre and Barry and I had some fun with it before I said something too loud next to tour leader where he explained it and everyone caught on. The final part was a 3D star experience which proceeded to show just how small you were in comparison with the rest of the universe. I think I fell asleep near the end.

I eagerly embraced the bed when we returned that night before getting up for our fourth and last day in Sydney.

AusTour 11: Sydney Day Two

Our first full day in Sydney we were out and ready to go by 9. As someone had said on the phone the day before when we were booking attractions, ‘if you’ve got see Sydney cards, you’ve probably got places to be.’ This was true, at 9am that morning we were heading to a 2 hour walking tour of Sydney that didn’t exist. The phone went to some security service, and we never actually found the booth. Regardless of that setback we went towards the Opera House looking for a tour. We successfully acquired a tour, led by a very amicable Sue around, in and outside the Opera House. Because we missed the 10am Sydney tour we luckily got into the opera part of the opera house (surprisingly the smaller side) before a 12pm performance. In all we got to see 3 of the theatres including the biggest two. Both of the big theatres were amazing, size-wise, technology-wise, whatever-wise. We weren’t aloud to take pictures though so you’ll have to see it for yourself. Following the tour there was some time for picture taking around the Opera House. On the tour Sue had explained all about the history of the Opera House and its design (which I couldn’t possible recount here)—the whole structure really is amazing. During some more down time we went into the Botanical Gardens for a quick look (there were bats roosting in the trees) before heading to the Rocks for a Rocks walking tour. It was a walking tour but it was also the most action packed history lesson anyone could have ever conceived. The history of the rocks was pretty much like the smelliest, dirties, hardest fought story ever told. Maybe I’m exaggerating, but the area of the Rocks has evolved a lot in history…from a bunch of rocks over a harbor, to a town where the shit flows down the rocks from your upstairs neighbors through your house, to a historical site known and preserved as the Rocks. Oh and I can now tell you whose on the A$20 bill now too. Following that, and with knowledge falling out of our ears, we practically ran to the scenic cruise of the harbor (with complimentary free drink). The cruise was good because we quietly sailed by the front of the opera house for a view from the harbor, and under the bridge and out to islands and other lands whose descriptions couldn’t possibly have fit in my head (There was something about a ship wreck, a fort, and the prime ministers house). The sun was setting as we glided past the opera house for the second time, giving it a slightly red glow.

As the sun was going down we raced to the sky tower practically in the middle of Sydney to get a look at Sydney before, during and after sunset. The sky tower is the tallest free standing structure in the southern hemisphere, rising 328 meters with observation deck up top (as well as restaurants) and Oztrek down bottom. The views up top were pretty awesome; both out to the mountain ranges where the sun was setting out to the harbour and out towards the sea. Oztrek downstairs was both mildly amusing and dreadfully tacky (that’s all I’m going to say about that).

With the sun now completely set we headed to our final destination for the night, the Aquarium. It was deserted pretty much, which was cool because there was no one there. Unfortunately the seals were asleep, but everything else was awake and swimming around. Of particular awesomeness was the oceanarium (the tubes where the fish swim around you). There were some huge fish, sharks and turtles floating around in there and again the best part was there was practically anyone there.

Following that we returned to the hotel and crashed. Like BSOD bad.

AusTour 10: See Sydney Cards

Just as an aside. We managed to get these See Sydney Cards which you essentially pay one price for and you get entrance to attractions all over Sydney. It eliminated the hassle of carrying cash around and came with transportation tickets too. Barry found the cards online and he makes it sound like he discovered the Holy Grail. I haven’t mentioned that it’s in the 3rd page of Sydney in the Lonely Planet. Anyway they were extremely useful in both getting around and getting into attractions. That is, except for the questions they all asked: “where are you from?” which of course could be for us, where did you just come from, where are you living, where are you a resident or even where are you a citizen?

AusTour 9: Sydney Day One

So, fittingly as today is the 35th anniversary of the opening of the Sydney Opera House, we arrived into Sydney (thanks Google). As we drove in from Newcastle we came in over the Sydney harbor bridge with the Opera House rising beneath us. It was definitely the way to arrive into Sydney, and the view of the Opera House really is stunning. I guess for me it was something I never really thought I would see, so seeing it for the first time was pretty awesome. Our bus dumped us outside Sydney’s Central Station and once again we had to rapidly learn the Sydney transport system. We were heading to Kings Cross, out to one side of the city (I couldn’t tell you what side because Sydney’s orientation confuses me), to stay at the Pink House—yea, it was in fact pink. After checking in we went for a walk, heading towards the botanical gardens, but this became problematical with the sheer number of dead ends we encountered. We made it about half way to the botanical gardens, down an inordinate number of uneven steps before heading back to Kings Cross and the Hostel. On the way back we passed the largest billboard in the southern hemisphere, owned and utilized by Coca-Cola. Lonely planet described Kings Cross as “a densely populated dichotomy of good and evil. Strip joints, tacky tourist shops and backpackers hostels bang heads with classy restaurants, funky bars and gorgeous guesthouses. The cross retains a sleazy, cannibalistic aura, but the vague sense of menace is more imaginary than real.” This is the most aptly worded and accurate statement I’ve read in the lonely planet. We spend the night doing laundry and planning how exactly we were going to conquer Sydney in three days.

AusTour 5: the Bus

In planning the trip we had looked at numerous was of getting from Brisbane to Sydney while stopping at some of the key places in between. We had decided to take a hop on hop off bus down the coast and found a company that would let us do it. For just $115 we were able to go from Brisbane to Sydney while stopping at Byron Bay, Port Macquarie and Newcastle. The bus had more stops (all the reasonably be towns down the coast) but those are the ones we had decided on. The bus would take us down the pacific highway for the most part. Busses departed daily with one bus departing Brisbane at 1pm and another at 3pm. There was also a third bus starting about halfway down the pacific highway starting at around 6am—we took this for the final trip into Sydney. Overall it was great value for money, and didn’t take up the day (travelling mostly during the night) so we could use the daylight to explore and holiday.

Outta Here

Its Spring Break…again! So I’m getting out of Melbourne with Barry from Hartford. We’re flying up to Brisbane tonight, to begin a trip down the coast towards and into Sydney. I’m lazy, so I stole Barry's map of the key stops on the trip.
I should ignore the part about being eaten by a shark. Not because it wont happen, but because I wont be posting a blog anytime in the next 13 days. I also have an extra part tagged on to the end of this trip, down to Adelaide in South Australia being as i have two weeks off for break and Barry only has one.