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Published: September 6th 2008
Within about 10 minutes of landing in Sydney, a random Aussie guy had heard our English accents and begun berating us about the state of the English cricket team. "When are you gonna bloody beat us, eh?"... and so forth. He was otherwise quite a nice chap, and I hadn't the heart to tell him that I care less about the state of national cricket than your average 14th Century Mongolian peasant cared about the proper blend of ingredients in a Bloody Mary.
Two whole minutes after checking in to our disgusting hostel in the red light district of Sydney we bumped into our mate Chris Koko. A lack of access to cash had lead to him wandering the streets aimlessly, attempting to ration his newly acquired beer addiction. Add in a beard cultivated in Goa and Thailand, and Mr K was running a look described in Zoolander as 'derelicte', or perhaps "hobo chic".
Something of a theme of our visit appeared to be trying to keep out with Koko's new found enormous appetite for drink. The first 24 ours of our stay in Sydney are now something of a blur, but I do know we managed to see
Sydney Sunset
From our hostel roof... Our hostel was disgusting but it had a great view!nothing of the city except that which is available from the window of a bar, and we awoke with stonking hangovers.
More luck was to be had on day two, we hung out with the hairy apostle of Psy Trance Chris again, but crucially with the civilizing influence (even Oliver Reed would be a civilizing influence on Koko right about now) of Jen, another mate who's moved over here. We did the whole tourist trip, the botanical gardens, the Opera house, that dirty great bridge etc. Obviously seen it on telly, but the Opera house is just fab, one of my top all time buildings. Maybe a bit understated though, would a touch of gold paint and a few fairy lights really be too much to ask?
The rest of our time in Sydney followed a similar vein, wandering, boozing, hurting in the head and spending cash like we actually had some. We made it out to the Hunter Valley to visit some of the cheesier mainstream wineries, caught up with our other mate Jonny (another UK refugee), and some of Chris's travelling mates.
Eventually the weather moved us on. While sunny, Sydney was hovering around the
You're the one for me, Batty
Flying Fox, Botantical Gardens 7 degree mark in the evenings. Nearly a week after arrival, and with thoroughly punished livers, we were on our way north to the hopeful sunshine of Byron Bay... We were definitely sad to be leaving our mates, but we're confident our wallets will thank us!
Anyhow, impressions of Sydney: shiny, clean and impressive, in almost every area excluding its hostels. Our first stop was a continuation on the Melbourne theme - fags, bits of pizza, broken glass - and all of this on the floor of the corridor outside our room. Add to this enough hair on the carpet of our room to make an Ozzey Osbourne wig. What is it with Aussie hostels? In (relatively) nearby NZ they're all clean and lovely.
Cheers
Si x x
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