Sydney Day #2

12/3/07

Today we got a late start because we had bought 24 hours of internet last night to watch the game (which we didn’t get to do), so we decided to post our blog entries and upload pictures to our web albums. Our initial plan for the day was to walk through the city to the Royal Botanic Gardens and then have lunch at another harbour, Circular Quay. However, before we left we called Claudia, which is a girl who we met in Airlie Beach and lives here. She couldn’t hang out with us, but she told us that we should catch a ferry from Circular Quay to Watsons Bay, which is a bay off of a small peninsula that faces the ocean (downtown Sydney is not right on the ocean, it’s more inland and the water from the ocean comes inland and makes all the harbours), so apparently the view is really beautiful, especially at a place called The Gap, which is a steep rocky cliff looking out at the sea.

So we decided to take the train (which is like the metro, but more elaborate and nicer) to Circular Quay, have lunch, and then take the ferry. We ate outside at an oyster bar, which was really good (we had a shellfish platter that had crab, crayfish, oysters, mussels, and bug – yes, I said bug; weird huh? it’s like a cross between a lobster and a crab, but I like crab better), and we had views of the big bridge where you can do the bridge climb.

For those of you who haven’t heard of it (and I hadn’t before we came here), the bridge climb allows you to strap yourself into climbing harnesses and you climb with a group up on the very top of this huge bridge (we took pictures of the bridge, so you can see how big it is). We have decided not to do it because it’s super expensive (~$200 each) and we have so many other things to see and you can’t take cameras up there, so we would have to buy pictures anyway! While we were eating lunch, huge storm clouds rolled in and all the groups on the bridge climb started racing down the bridge. It was pretty crazy to watch. Thankfully, they made it down before the rain came, which was extremely heavy, so we went inside the restaurant to wait it out.

By the time the rain passed, it was pretty late, and we had actually missed the last ferry to Watsons Bay, so we decided to walk through the Royal Botanic Gardens and go to Watsons Bay tomorrow. The Royal Botanic Gardens were really pretty, but what is up with the flies in Australia?!?! In Airlie Beach and here, the flies have been really aggressive. They land on you constantly, and fly in your ear. It’s so annoying!

Anyway, after walking through the gardens, we took a break in the hotel room and then went to eat dinner at a sushi restaurant. It was really good. After dinner, we went back to the hotel room and just lounged around. Of course, we went to bed early again :) Seems to be a common theme with us now. But that’s fine with me. Tomorrow we’ll get up early and catch an early ferry to Watsons Bay. It’s supposed to be cloudy tomorrow, but hopefully it won’t rain.

Here are the pictures we took of the harbour and the botanic gardens:



Random thought:
How to spot an Irish person: The “h” eating “t’s”.
Apparently, Irish people don’t know how to say the “th” sound, so they would say 3:30 is “tree tirty”, or more likely “half tree” (Europeans and Australians would say “half three” for 3:30 instead of saying “three thirty” or even “half past three”). However, Irish people do know how to say the “sh” sound, so it only seems to be the t’s that eat the h’s :)