First things first. The weekend before I went to Sydney I went to Gold Coast to hangout with a girlfriend for the weekend. Friday night we went to the Blues Festival that was going on. Her Aunt and Uncle's friends usually rent an apartment for this weekend at the Aria hotel. Their original place had water damage so the place upgraded them to the penthouse for the weekend! It was 2 stories, over a dozen bedrooms and a lap pool inside! We hungout upstairs for a bit then headed down to the Blues Festival. We walked around for a few hours, got dinner, listened to some good music then headed back to her place. The next day we walked around her neighborhood a bit then headed over to the Carrara Markets. This is like a farmer's market but bigger. Kind of like the one I described from Melbourne. They had cheap clothes, food, souvenirs, etc. I went back to Brisbane later that day and it was back to school. That was the last week of classes before finals.
I went on my last major trip this past weekend to Sydney for 2 and a half days. It was a bit colder than Brisbane, but mostly sunny so that was nice. The first day I got there I walked around a bit in the local parks, one was a tribute to King George the something and the other was Hyde Park which has this huge fountain in it with lots of ancient Greek figures. One man was wrestling with a bull and then there were random turtles spitting water in the fountain. I then headed over to the Sydney Tower. I went up to where there were 20-30 different restaurants. I had so many options for once! They had sushi, Chinese, American, sandwiches, salads, etc. I ended up getting a spring roll and some chicken which was perfect. I then went up and as you can see in the pictures could see all of Sydney! From 250 meters up I would hope I could see everything...10 meters is 30 feet, for those who want to do the math. I then went down and walked around on Market St. which is like Queen St. in Brisbane, it's just a road with no cars and lots of shops on each side. I walked through some shops, but didn't see much that appealed to my interests. After walking around for a bit and being a little tired I hopped onto the city sightseeing bus, which is a double-decker bus like you would see in the UK, with the top part open. It was a hop on hop off service that went around the entirety of Sydney. If you stayed on it from start to finish it was an hour and a half commentated tour. But I obviously had to look around.
So what did I see first. I think my first stop was the bridge and opera house. Both are magnificent up close! Apparently there were lots of discrepancies about the opera house, but it eventually got built. I then walked over to the Circular Quay which is what the terminal/harbor is called. There were a bunch of shops and obviously tour boats just waiting to launch. Across the way was the Overseas passenger terminal where the large cruise ships (that can fit under the bridge) pull up and unload there passengers. Fun fact! The QEII among other boats, I'm assuming, that can't fit under the bridge have to obviously unload elsewhere. They unload in Darling harbor/the Rocks. Which is the area/harbor just next door. After that I hopped back on the bus and we went past Parliament, the Botanical Gardens, Central Station, a bunch of museums, the fish market, a casino, etc. We basically went past everything. Another fun fact. Australia decided to build an aquatics center after the Olympic swimmer/medalist Ian Thorpe. It cost $40 million! Now don't you think that money could have gone to better use?
After a long day of walking, I went back to my hostel for some food and drinks. I had chicken parmigiana on top of fries instead of spaghetti, apparently that's how they do it here. But it was delicious to say the least. I stayed up for a bit to watch a rugby game and then went to bed early because I was beat.
The next day my friends arrived and we yet again walked around the entire city. We went to the opera house and bridge first of course. Then we walked from the Circular Quay to Darling Harbor to the Rocks and back again, past the opera house to the botanical gardens. It's just getting to be fall here so there were some trees with their leaves changing colors and such. It reminded me of home. Next on our list was the Sydney observatory. It wasn't too fascinating but there was a cool telescope inside. Next we walked back down to the Rocks/Circular Quay and walked by the Aquarium which had a legoland inside. But on the outside there was a lego statue of legoman and a horse and then King Triton! Obviously I got a picture with him. There was also a few cool statues and one from the Sydney Olympics. By this point we were all pretty tired so we hopped on a bus and took it back to the hostel. We sat down by the bar and I again had chicken parmigiana because it was so good the night before. We watched a bit of another rugby game then passed out early again. The next day I had to leave for the airport and my friends went off to Bondi beach.
It was a great trip! Although it was the last time I will be on a plane until I am on my way back to the States.
