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Sydney Opera House
A stunning building built into the harbour and considered one of the wonders of the modern world... beautiful! First off, our apologies in not keeping up with our travel blog for the remainder of our trip – needless to say, Internet difficulties made our “blog-keeping” quite difficult. However, we do plan to finish the blog, despite the fact that we are currently back in Steamboat Springs. We will likely write the blog in present tense from time to time, but don’t be fooled because we are not still off gallivanting around the world, as much as we both wish that we were! So, without much more to say, here starts the continuation of our blog, a few months late…
From New Zealand, we caught a flight to Sydney to begin our ventures in Australia. For a time reference, this was in mid-January. You may remember hearing about the devastating floods in Australia earlier this year, and it just so happened that we flew into Australia and the very height of the flooding. Initially most of the flooding was affecting Queensland and Brisbane, and at the time, we were in Sydney, quite far removed from all of it. However, our original plan was to rent a car and drive north along the Gold Coast, taking in some summer sun
Park with a view
The little park outside of the Sydney Observatory overlooking the Harbour Bridge. and beaches until we reached Brisbane. With parts of Brisbane submerged by the raging inland tsunami at the time, we changed our plans and to head south along the coast, into Victoria and eventually to Melbourne. But before heading south, we spent a couple of awesome days in Sydney, one of my very favorite cities in the world! We mostly walked around the gorgeous city, just taking it all in during the day. At first we had discussed climbing the infamous Harbour Bridge, but due to the fact that it was ridiculously expensive to do so, we paid a lot less to walk up 200 steps to the Pylon Lookout for some history and a pretty view. We were staying at the edge of Hyde Park, a stunning green-space on the eastern side of the CBD (central business district), making most of our excursions complete with a walk through the park. One night we explored Chinatown and found some deliciously authentic Chinese food, and the next night we did what everyone must do while in Sydney: pay a visit to the beautiful Sydney Opera House. Amazing! We were lucky enough to catch an incredible show, Le Grand Cirque – Adrenaline,
Harbour Bridge
The world's largest (but not longest) steel arch bridge across Sydney's harbour that first opened in 1932. seeing people perform the most insane tricks in the world! After a stunning show, we did the romantic thing and had a bottle of wine with dessert at the harbour’s edge, ending our short stay in Sydney on a really high note.
The next day we rented a car and started the drive south, not really having any set plans since we had to change our trip at the last minute. We had three nights until we needed to be in Melbourne, so the loose plan was to drive some, camp some and surf some those three days. On the drive, I read about some really cool campsites on the beach, complete with kangaroos hopping all around your tent, but little did we know that most Aussies were on the road and camping for their summer vacation as well. Long story short, the only available free campsite we could find those three days was situated right next to the runway of an airport and not even near the good beaches. No thank you. After a fruitless campsite search, we found a room at the Comfort Inn in Bateman’s Bay, which ironically enough, turned out to be one of the
Pylon Lookout
After 200 steps, this is the view from the Pylon Lookout. nicest places we stayed on our entire trip. This was no ordinary Comfort Inn, it was more like a Four Seasons, and the food was incredible, albeit expensive (but then again, everything is expensive in Australia). As far as the town, Bateman’s reminded me of Myrtle Beach… what could be a pretty area, but instead, touristy, trashy and not the least bit exciting (in my opinion, that is). From Bateman’s we drove to Broulee Beach, not too far down the road, and found an adorable B&B that was part of an older couple’s home. Expensive but adorable, cozy, right next to a gorgeous beach and included champagne and a delicious homemade breakfast! The next morning we took our first-ever surf lesson with Broulee Surf School… sweet as! Despite the cloudy, drizzly skies and freezing water temperatures, we had a great time learning a new sport. Because of our age, we were put into an older group since there were a lot of kids learning to surf on their summer vacations from school. It just so happened that Eli was the only guy in our group… awesome… and it also just so happened that he stood up on the board his
Harbour Bridge Traffic
Did you know that 161,000 vehicles cross this bridge every day? very first try! WTF! Our instructor had said that it was easier for men to initially stand up than women because of their upper-body strength, and in our little group, that seemed evident. However, Eli had trouble after his initial ease getting up on the surf board and only was able to stand up a few times after that. It took me quite a few tries, but I eventually stood up as well. While we may have not been the most graceful surfers out there, we had a blast and were ready for more surfing! From Broulee Beach we drove south, ending up in Mallacoota, a small town surrounded by the pretty Croajingolong National Park. Again, we could not find the camping we were looking for and ended up in a nicer hotel room again, but we did rent surf boards the next morning for a few hours before heading to Melbourne. The Mallacoota beach was gorgeous although cloudy that day and there was quite the current, making our second go at surfing a little more difficult than the first time. Either way, a few hours in the water and we were spent. Off to Melbourne for the Aussie Open!
Harbour Bridge
Say cheez! Sydney's harbour and infamous Harbour Bridge. We arrived in Melbourne in the afternoon, which was good, because the design of that city is absolutely crazy for drivers, not to mention that we were driving on the left side of the road and everything seemed backwards to us anyways. After a few stops to ask for directions, a lot of wrong turns and a bit of a headache, we arrived at Victoria Hall, a boutique backpacker’s hostel downtown Melbourne. Whew! It just so happened that it was the 18th, which meant that it was our 4-month anniversary, so we treated ourselves to a delicious and authentic dinner at a small, cute and loud Italian bistro run by an Italian family who didn’t speak much English… it was awesome! But the real treat for us was the next day we spent at the 2011 Australian Open! I’ve never been to a Grand Slam, Eli has been to the U.S. Open, but since we are both tennis players, we were so incredibly excited. We bought the day-pass that included access to all arenas except for Rod Laver, the main one, since those tickets were a bit out of our price range. We were lucky enough to see Sharapova,
Hyde Park, Sydney
Summer flowers and historic buildings in and around Hyde Park. Djokivic, Verdasco, Fish, Monfils, Wozniacki and more all in one day… AMAZING! It was only day 3 of the tournament, so things were just getting exciting, but we still managed to see some great tennis and I even made it onto Aussie TV that evening! After an unexpected trip south from Sydney due to the flooding in Queensland, we caught a flight the next morning to northern Queensland, which was not affected by the flooding, but our plane did have to make a stop in Brisbane… let’s hope we don’t get washed away!
Until next time… G’day Mate!
e squared everywhere (written by Erin)
P.S. Don't forget to scroll down and check out the rest of our photos!
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