Sydney

We spent a week in Sydney.  Details below.  Here are some pics we took.   More to see on other pages to come.  

Sydney Opera House event

Bondi Beach near Sydney

Manly Beach near Sydney

Hotel balcony view

Sydney has historically been the largest city in Australia, but has recently been caught by Melbourne.  Sydney and Melbourne have a healthy rivalry.   Melbourne claims to be the more sporting city with much better coffee.  As our Sydney tour guide said, “Melbourne weather is rubbish, we have better beaches and we have the harbour and opera house, enough said, we win!”  

We did not have any special tours booked in Sydney before we arrived.   We had bought tickets to an event at the Sydney Opera House for Saturday night.  It was an event where they play the movie “Singing in the Rain” on a video screen while the Sydney Symphony Orchestra play the movie’s music live on stage in front of the screen.   

We flew to Sydney via Jetstar from Adelaide.  Our flight was pleasant and arrived on time at about 2:30pm.  We called an Uber to get from the airport to our accommodation, the Meriton Suites on Kent Street in the central business district.  We had a beautiful one bedroom unit at the Meriton, including a well equipped kitchenette and laundry in the room, a sitting area with a couch and tv and a fantastic view from the 55th floor balcony!  

After we settled into the room and went to get some groceries at a large supermarket about a half a block away for our daily breakfasts, we then had a nice meal of Fish and Chips at a pub called the Three Wise Monkeys nearby our hotel.  That evening we booked a guided walking tour for the next day.  

The walking tour had a great guide who gave us really good info and history about many sights of Sydney, sprinklered in with some perfect dry humour.   The tour was a “free” type where you tip what you feel it was worth at the end.  The tour was about three hours and finished by the harbour.   We took our time going back to the hotel and this made for a leisurely day.  We had a great supper near Chinatown at a local Thai restaurant called Thai 44.  

On day 2 we set out to take in some local art, starting out with the Anzac War Memorial in Hyde Park, then the nearby Australian Museum, then on to the State Library of New South Wales, followed  by the Art Gallery of New South Wales and then the historic Queen Victoria Building shopping arcade (not for shopping but just to view the beautiful architecture).    We finished the day with a great supper of Nepalese food at Momo’s Hub restaurant near our hotel.

On day 3 we had a leisurely morning and in the afternoon we took the water taxi ferry across the Sydney Harbour (to North Sydney!) and walked back across the Sydney Harbour Bridge.  This has to be one of the most spectacular walks we have ever taken.  It is not stop spectacular views, of the harbour, Opera House, cruise port and business district.   

On day 4 we took a local bus to Bondi Beach.  We walked the beach and had lunch there.  We then undertook the shoreline walk from Bondi Beach to Coogee Beach, about a 3 hour trek that hugs the shoreline cliffs.  It is a speactacular walk with beautiful views the full way.  It passes through the beaches of Tamarama, Bronte, Clovelly and Gordon’s Bay as well.   At Coogee, we met up with a good Newfoundland friends sister, who has lived in Australia for 25 years.  She brought us a beautiful gift package filled with local Australia goodies, very nice Pinot Noir Australian wine, Lamingtons, Tim Tams and Vegemite!  This was such a surprise and so thoughtful.

On day 5 we took a local water taxi ferry to Manly to explore the area and see the famously popular Manly Beach.  We walked the beach and around the pedestrian retail area and we had a great fish and chips lunch at Manly Beach.  On this day they had a weekly outdoor market with stalls of various items in Manly, which was interesting to browse around.  We returned to central Sydney by ferry, picked up some Indian take away food for supper and then went and attended the show at the Sydney Opera House.  The Opera House is obviously spectacular on the outside and also stunning on the inside and has recently been renovated inside.

On day 6, we went back to the Australian Museum to attend a special exhibition called Ramses, about a famous Egyptian Pharaoh.  In the afternoon we explored the area around Darling Harbour, which was not far from our hotel.  We finished the day with a great Italian meal at the Macchiato Wood Fire Pizza and Coffee Roasters restaurant near our hotel.