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Published: February 8th 2007
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uuuuurrrrggggggg
f**kin heavy is all i can say wow it's been a while since i we wrote one of these things, and trying to remeber all the things we have done while we've been here is gonna be tough.
well it all started at sydney airport where everybodys bags from the plane got misplaced some how and didn't even get to the carousel machine for a good 30 mins, really annoying, but at least it wasn't just my bag it was everybodies. We caught a cab in to the city and straight to our hostel, which i thought was pretty cool, a massive backpackers with big dorm rooms. It was pretty much as i had expected it to be, not much different from the ones i've stayed in before, but for El this was to be a whole new experience, she had never stayed in a hostel before, or a bunk bed. We were in a six bed dorm which i struck lucky with being put in with El and 4 japenese girls, no bad smells (except for me) and the room was clean to only thing was that the other 4 girls just wouldn't/couldn't speak english except for hello as we showed up a goodbye when we
sydney bridge by night
we took this from our hotel room, on our anniversary. left 3 nights later. This didn't really matter as we were hardley at the hostel anyway preferring to spend our time exploring the city, and using the internet to catch up with people. our first night in sydney was spent online, pretty boring really but a nessesity, it also allowed us to be fresh and ready the next morning for exploring the harbour area.
Sydney harbour is amazing i absolutly loved it, the opera house and the bridge are just as good in real life as they look in the pictures. we managed to spend the whole day walking around the opera house and taking pictures of it and the bridge. It was during this day that we formulated our plan for the next couple of day's, our anniversary was only a couple of days away and how amazing it would be to spend the night in one of the huge 5* hotels over looking the harbour, it was a once in a life time sort of thing, and something we couldn't pass up. so we looked into the different hotels spaced around the harbour and decided on the shangri-la hotel, just set back from the harbour but with
us just chillin in sydney
after a hard long walk we just collapsed down on the floor outside the opera house for a much deserved break. no other building between its top floors and the harbour. with this decided we booked it and set out for the night, on the recomendation of good friend D Z greene we went to the kings cross area of the city, this is a red light district as far as i could work out, sex shops/shows, strippers, it was a bit like our soho, and enjoyed walking through it. I did notice that alot of the hostels we had thought about staying in were also in this area, we were both releived that we hadn't picked one of these hostels. The following morning it was time for us to move all our belongs to the other end of the city and to the hotel, i thought that this would be a good time to get El to try actually carrying her back pack for more than 5 mins at a time, it took us nearly 45 mins to do the 25 min journey, but at least she made it and "lived to tell the tale"
the shangri-la was THE best place i've ever stayed in, in my life. the bathroom was bigger than some of the hostels we're staying
Dave and the bridge
it's me and the bridge init, pretty self explanatory. in now, and the view was amazing. We were up on the 20 something floor and from the bed we had a great view out over the harbour with the bridge to the left and the opera house to the right. We spent our day in the hotel taking photos from our bedroom window and generally abusing the hotels facilities, the swiming pool, the sauna and the free tea were all taken advantage of, before we went down to one of the hotels resturants for our dinner. The meal was quite nice, it was a buffet menu with different sections from which to go and get food from. There was a seafood, italian, japanese, chinese and indian section as well as a dessert section ( this section being the main attraction for El, what with it's chocolate fountain) We stayed in here for ages making sure we got our moneys worth, El eating lot's of desserts and me just trying bits of everything and lot's of new stuff like oysters ( quite nice) and sushi (not my favorite). After dinner we rode the lift to the top floor where the bar is and had a drink looking out over the
our hotel view
this is the view from the bed in our hotel room. now dark harbour compairing it to the view from our room ( ours was better we decided) after our drink it was back to our room for some more photo taking.
It was a shame to have to leave but we couldn't afford another night in this place, that one night cost the same as a weeks living exspences while backpacking. So it was back to hosteling again and also a change of place as this hostel wasn't around the CBD of sydney but a little way out in an area called Glebe.
The glebe village backpackers is a great little hostel, run really well with fair sized rooms and quite a homely feel to the place, this was to be our home for the next week untill we decided what we wanted to do. The days and nights here are a bit of a blur but i remeber meeting up with El's old boss laura and her family for one night and having a home cooked meal again (been missing that since we left Melbourne). We took a ferry to Manly beach, was realy nice here much nicer than bondi. We spent another day wandering around the
the opera house by night
how stunning is that eh, i'd never get bored of waking up to that. city looking at stuff we didn't need and couldn't afford to buy and another day walking around glebe looking into the little bohemian shops and arty cafes. This area has the same kind of feel that camden market has. It was from this place that we also made up our minds to go to the blue mountains, a two hour train ride outside of the city.
The blue mountains was an experience worthy of its own blog so i'll write one later.
When we came back to sydney from the blue mountains we stayed at a hostel right near to the transport terminal, this we thought to be wise, with us having to catch an early morning bus to newcastle in a couple of days. i Have mixed feelings about this hostel as it was the first place that i realy just got talking to a fellow traveller (i'm doing better now) but ultimatly this was the place that gave me and El bed bugs so i doubt i would ever go back there. From this base we took a day trip out to Bondi beach were i found that it's all hype from english people about how
nice it is, even Aussies think Manly is a much nicer beach and i'd deffinetly have to agree with them. Being disapointed with Bondi and having heard another beach just down the coast was nice we set off along the cliff tops in search of this beach. 3 hours of up and down cliffs and we finally made it to Coogee beach, this was a nice family beach which wasn't to crowded and decided that we'd spend the rest of our day here before getting the bus back.
on the hole sydney was a great place to stay in, it was different enough to still feel like a holiday but reminded us of London just enough to make us feel at home, the only bad thing about it all is that our last night in Sydney regretably was spent scratching the bites on our arms and legs given to us by the flea pit we chose to stay in.
the next morning we caught the grey hound and left sydney saying good bye as teh bus crossed teh harbour bridge.
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Claude
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TThere is a picture missing!
I am disappointed to have a close up of the bugs bites! So glad to see you enjoying the adventure and well done for the 5 star hotel. I guess In need to go back to Sidney. I felt home reading your account of Sidney Glebe's town as Sophie had found me a guest house a few minutes walk from the back pack. I also agree about Bondi Beach. See you very soon, XX