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Published: November 11th 2006
Oiy Oiy Sydneysiders!
After a 6 hour bus journey from that place they called 'the port' and very little sleep I arrived in the wonderful city of Sydney! As we approached the centre, the sun was just rising and made for some spectacular views of the skyline as we arrived. I was pretty damn excited to be here!
On arrival at Central station I headed to Kings Cross on the train and made the short walk to Potts Point where my backpacker place was. After waking the woman up and checking in I jumped into my bunk for a couple of hours sleep. Too excited to sleep I disembarked from the bunk at around 9.30am, had a quick shower, chucked on some clothes and headed outside to see what the days weather had brought with it. The answer to that was a lovely clear sunny day, a bit of a wind but a lovely day none the less. Perfect! Thank you please.
One of the best ways to see the sights of Sydney is on foot... so that's what I did. Leaving the Kings Cross area behind I headed through the slightly more classy Potts Point area, popular
with the 'arty types', and walked down towards the harbour to be immediately greeted with some striking views of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Opera House and Harbour Bridge in the distance. After eventually working out where the steps where, I headed down to Finger Wharf in Woolloolooloo bay. That's its real name - honest! I navigated my way around the wharf that was crowded with moored boats and walked around the Royal Botanic Gardens towards Hyde Park. There are some lovely green park lands here backed by great views of the Sydney skyline. On arrival I discovered that there was some sort of event being set up - A good food festival raising money for aids awareness. Lots of restaurants in Sydney would be setting up little stands where they would give good quality nosh in exchange for a voucher purchased minutes earlier from the voucher stall. Perfect - I love food!
And so, I made a mental note to return to this event before walking back to the Botanic Gardens to explore. The gardens here are pretty huge and wonderfully landscaped. As well as some pretty special tree's, plants and sculptures they are full of life. There are
The Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge
Taken from a lovely spot in the royal botanic gardens.these particular trees that are full of hundreds and hundreds of fruit bats just hanging out there in the middle of the day. Pretty cool, unless your scared of bats! There are lots of grassland area's with some amazing views of the Sydney buildings, the Opera house and the Harbour Bridge. Definitely one of the best gardens I've been in anyway. Whilst I was at these fabulous gardens on this beautiful sunny day in Sydney, I saw a wedding taking place. A pretty nice place to be married me thinks.
After my leisurely walk in these magical gardens my tummy was starting to tell me something. It was time to go back to the good food festival in Hyde Park. Well, you've got to do your bit for "the aids" haven't you! The place was teeming with people and probably had about 100 food stands from restaurants and other food establishments around Sydney. I exchanged my crisp 20 dollar bill for some tokens and headed off into this gastronomical wonderland. Eating at fine restaurants in Australia is pretty expensive so this was a great way to give my belly the treat it deserved. I started with a Thai beef
noodle soup from a Thai restaurant, followed by barbecued King prawns in a special curried sauce from a top fish restaurant. Both Amazing! I used up my final tokens on some homemade lime and mint marshmallows. Yum Yum! I should go to more of these food festivals!
It was then time to visit one of the most iconic buildings in the world. That strange looking building they call the Sydney Opera House. Strange it may be but this modern expressionist "house" is pretty attractive from any angle, especially when you have the Sydney Harbour bridge in the background framing it! I spent a good number of minutes here just relaxing and checking out this pretty special place. The designer was a man called Jørn Utzon who won a competition back in 1957. Due to some political reasons that I've heard mixed opinions about, Jørn Utzon was forced to leave the project before it could be finished. Whilst he was able to complete the wonderful structure of sail-like shells and spherical domes that is the shell of the building, the insides were left unfinished. Someone else had to complete them with limited funds. And for these reasons perhaps, the inside's
Sydney Opera House
This place relects the sun in some crazy ways! aren't particularly special.. lots of bare concrete! And Jørn Utzon has never returned to Sydney to see the place in person. He must have been pretty pissed off!
Just around from the Opera house is Circular Quay. It's circular in shape and is a Quay, hence the name "Circular Quay". Perfect! Anyway, this is where you can take a harbour cruise, or perhaps take a ferry to the destination of your choice. It's a lively bustling place, lots of people traffic, street performers, the odd mental homeless person, ice cream sellers and a selection of expensive cafes and restaurants. After navigating my way around this place stopping only to feed my eye's with some visual delights, I headed on to "the rocks". Traditionally the rocks is where the aboriginal Cadigal people lived. This rocky place that they now call "the rocks" is where sailors of the first fleet stepped ashore in 1788 and British settlement of Australia was first established. Nice! Today the rocks is located between the Harbour Bridge and Opera House and is Sydney's old town. It contains Sydney's oldest buildings and some very nice ones at that. It's a cool place to walk around and is
Sydney Opera House
Kids lining up for a kodak moment definately not short of character. The buildings have now been transformed into shops, cafes, restaurants and a visitors centre. The oldest pub in Sydney still remains here. A very enjoyable couple of hours were spent here by that person I like to call "Me", and there was a rather nice market for me to explore. Good times.
Oh my darling... Oh my darling! My next port of call was a lovely place named Darling harbour! Darling harbour is a an attractive looking place, full of expensive looking yachts, an extremely wide variety of restaurants and bars, museums, a cinema, and a number of other tourist attractions. Apart from all these things that will drain your wallet dry from money, Darling harbour is a cool place to just sit and enjoy the views as the sun goes down and reflects off the large buildings surrounding the place. And that's what I did! Perfect!
As the sun sneaked down behind the tallest building in the distance I had just enough time to make it to the bridge. When I say "the bridge" I mean the most famous bridge in Australia and possibly the world. The Sydney Harbour Bridge. The bridge
Sydney Harbour Bridge
An pretty amazing construction is just as big in person as it looks in the pictures I had seen. It is the worlds largest steel arch bridge and an extremely impressive one at that. Take the wonderful location and the amazing scenery and you have one of the most spectacular sights in the world. It took me a while to find the entry point to the passenger walkway but I did with the aid of my trusty map and my amazing sense of direction! As I walked across the bridge it was busy with traffic zooming along. Rush hour I expect! The views over the harbour and of the Opera House were fantastic and as the sun set behind me the sky's turned pink. As the natural light faded the traffic and buildings lit up themselves to provide me with more visual pleasures. Pretty special! It was then time for me to make my way back to my hostel and cook myself some dinner before eventually visiting the land of nod.
I can't believe I did all that in one day! No wonder I was tired out! Actually I was exhausted, but my first day in Sydney was amazing. I love the city
The Opera House
From circular quay already!
As to be expected, the next day I had myself a little lye in. By the time I got myself sorted it was already approaching lunchtime and time to decide what to do. There are so many decisions you have to make when you are travelling, it is endless. Especially when you are on a tight time scale.
As the morning had come and just about gone, but left behind some lovely weather I decided to make the most of it and head to the beach! Bondi beach is Sydney's most famous beach and isn't that far from the city centre. A short train ride through a couple of stations and I arrive at Bondi junction. Just enough time to check out the shops that are here before boarding the bus for the journey to Bondi beach. It is possible to just get a bus from the city straight to the beach but it takes longer and I was feeling lazy on this fine day.
I arrived at this very large city beach that is backed by a massive line of shops, cafes, clubs, accommodation, and some parkland area. Bondi is a surfers beach to its
heart and was the first beach in Australia to have a surf lifesaving club, established back in 1907. There's a good vibe going down at Bondi. There's a skate park, graffiti, lots of surfers, walkers, skaters, drinkers, families, and loads of people just chilling out. There is a very cosmopolitan feel with lots of Europeans who have settled here. I noticed a good number of Irish voices as I was walking along - so obviously lots of lephrecauns around! There was some pretty good surf on this day and I spent some time walking around the headland watching these guys and gals playing in the waves. It was then time for me to grab some lunch and sit on the grassland just behind the beach with my white winged enemies - the seagulls.
The rest of the afternoon was spent chilling on the beach at various spots and just soaking up the atmosphere. A great day out. By the time I left it had got dark... I made my way back via the bus and train and enjoyed another dinner at the hostel. Kings Cross is not far from Potts Point where I was staying so I decided to
The Opera House at Dusk
Taken from the harbour bridge check out some of the bars... A mix of backpacker bars, backpackers, strip joints, drug dealers, pubs, clubs, tramps, weirdo's, beggars and choosers.. But as we all no, beggars can't be choosers. Anyway, this place is kind of cool in a dirty, smutty, cheap, lively, crazy kind of a way. Safe!
The next day a little voice inside my head told me to move house, or hostel anyway. So I did... I packed up my gear and headed to central station where very conveniently right opposite is one of the best hostels I've stayed in. Wake Up Central! A pretty amazing place. A large old listed building but extremely modern and clean inside. This was more like a hotel... the only thing differentiating it was the 4 bunks in the room and all the backpackers. A lovely place. That little voice in my head sure knows what he's talking about! Perfect! Cheers mate!
I've been travelling for 108 days now without a haircut. Somehow my hair has just about survived this long - I guess it started pretty short. However, it has now been bleached so much by the sun that Australians are calling me Blondie! Today it
Sydney Harbour Bridge Arch
From the passenger walkway was time for a haircut. It cost a fair bit the man who cut it was from Belgium, but I was happy with it so I guess it was worth it. Feels good to have short hair again!
It was then time to meet up with some of the people I met in Cairns who are working in Sydney. We went to this place called Scubar and as well as getting pretty hammered I came second in the crab race. Crab number 8 - "Popper" did pretty well, came through on the finishing straight and won me a hat and something they called a football? The last time I watched a football match footballs were round! Oh well.
31st October 2006 - Happy Halloween!!! Time to climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge to celebrate this scary occasion. The bridge climb set me back 170 dollars which is pretty steep but I guess it was something I may not get to do again so you have to take these opportunities while you can!
I'm glad I forked out the 170 dollars - it was well worth it. The climb experience lasted about 3 and a half hours. First they
give you this attractive climbing suit to put on, fix you up with a harness, and give you this little thing which is like a dog lead which means you are attached to the bridge at all times. It makes it feel pretty safe! They then fix you up with a headset so that your guide can speak to you during the climb. It's all pretty neat! There were only 6 peeps in our group including some oldies from Godmanchester which was pretty weird. To those of you who have never heard of Godmanchester - its near where I live. It's a small world!
After an alcohol breath test which I passed but did for a minute think I might fail, we began the climb. Out onto the bridge entrance we went attached to the little metal railing by our dog leads! We headed across the steel to the first pilon and walked across a part they call the catwalk which is a grating with a long drop to the water below. This is where many people turn back apparently. Now, I'm not the biggest fan of heights but found this bit OK. It was then time to climb
the ladders to to the eastern arch which is pretty cool as you watch all of the traffic underneath you. Then for the best bit... climbing the arch! For this bit you are right on top of the bridge and as you make your way to the summit you are rewarded with some spectacular views of the harbour and opera house! Our guide was brilliant and made the climb even better providing information and pointing out important landmarks - like John Travolta's house! You climb in stages so have time to enjoy the experience and the amazing views. The top of the bridge stands 134 metres above the harbour and the views from the top are pretty perfect! You can see for miles right out to Bondi and Manly. Its a pretty amazing feeling when you reach the top! After climbing across the centre of the bridge we descended the arch on the other side as the sun was setting. Pretty Special! The only bad thing is that you can't take anything up with you, like a camera for instance. They give you one photo for free and take others but they were ridiculously expensive so I will just take
home with me the memories in my crazy little head! A great experience! Loved it.
It's now November which feels very strange to me. I can't believe it! I've also started seeing Christmas decorations and even a Santa Clause which just felt weird. It just doesn't feel like that time of year! Oh well - I'm not complaining. Might as well go to the beach on this lovely spring day in November! I took the ferry from Circular Quay to Manly harbour which is cheaper than taking a harbour cruise and gives you the same special views of the harbour as you sail through it. On arrival at Manly on this beautiful day I headed straight to the beach and decided to go for a stroll around to the next bays, cabbage tree bay and Shelly beach. After a nice walk and climbing over some rocks I found this cool secluded spot to sit and watch the surfers. Then, a massive pod of dolphins swam by and right between all of the surfers. It was pretty cool - there were loads of them. Me likes the dolphins! I spent the rest of the day on the main beach before
taking the ferry back as the sun was going down. Amazing views as we sailed back into the harbour!!
The Blue Mountains are about 2 hours drive from Sydney and I decided to head there on a day trip. In a small group we drove out of Sydney and to the base of the mountains where we stopped in a grassy forested area to check out some of the resident wildlife. We saw some wild kangaroo's which had little Joey's - pretty cute, and a red bellied black snake - very venomous, not so cute, but pretty cool all the same. We then headed into the mountains and to a place called Blackheath where we headed to the Grand Canyon. Some spectacular views from the lookouts with the blue haze of the mountains caused by the oily mist given off by the eucalyptus trees. We then walked down into the valley of the canyon on a 3 hour bush walk into the rain forest below and out again. Some cool stuff down there and some bush berries, and leaves to be eaten for good measure! Yum. I'd rather have a box of Jaffa Cakes though! can't seem to find
them anywhere here!
You get some mad birds here in Oz - massive colourful cockatoo's and parrot type things. After a tiring walk in the heat we headed to Katoomba to ride the steepest railway in the world down into another rainforest in an old mining area. Then it started to rain - lots! Well, I guess it is a rainforest! After a walk down below we took the cable car back up in the rain and headed back to Sydney. Good stuff. Nice trip!
The next day was rainy! Booooo! Oh well, I can't complain its been pretty perfect most of the week! I decided to embrace this cloudy day and head on a coastal walk from Coogee beach to Bondi beach. A good bit of exercise, some nice scenery, and some mad sculptures to been as it was the 'sculptures by the sea' festival. Safe! Anyway, after checking out the ocean and stuff I headed back to base to prepare...
Now I've said before that you win some and you loose some and its so true. After getting back from my stormy sailing trip in the Whitsunday's I was browsing the Internet and Sasha's website
in particular only to discover that he would be playing in Sydney at Home the week I'm there! Alongside his friend - Mr John Digweed. Now if there's ever a time to use the word 'perfect' its definitely now. It could have been more perfect. I had been checking the Home website for the previous months hoping that there might be something good on, but I didn't expect it to work out like that. Amazing - I ordered my ticket straight away. As Shiny Tim would say... "That's just the icing on the cake". And it was!
Now its not easy to find people that are into the same music as you when your travelling or those that will pay $75 to go to a club - most people are on a tight budget. So I went on my own. Not that it matters. I like going to clubs on my own - you always meet like minded crazy twisted people who love the music like me. And so, I headed to the bottle shop for some supplies and sat in the dorm drinking with these American girls who were in there with me. I've met loads of American
girls who are studying in Sydney or somewhere in Oz. Lots of them do it. Popular stuff! One of these was called Britney - like Britney Spears. Brilliant! Love it.
Anyway, I was getting pretty excited so headed to Darling Harbour at opening time, 11.00pm. Home is in a pretty amazing location overlooking this wonderful harbour which lights up magically at night. I queued up, entered and began the usual amazing stuff! Its a pretty cool club, a top sound system, good main room with a balcony and some other small rooms which boast views and balconies overlooking the harbour. The club filled up quickly and was jam packed within an hour.
Sasha with his freshly shaven head and Digweed with his freshly straightened hair looking somewhat like Doogle out of the magic roundabout began their 5 hour set at 1.00am. This was the first the first time they had played together in Oz for 5 years - pretty special. And it lived right up to my expectations - an amazing set in every way. I loved every minute of it. The majority of the crowd here were English, Irish, or Scottish! Lots of Sasha fans living in
Sydney apparently. I met some cool people with those like minded souls that I was on about earlier, in particular some peeps that used to go to Crasher. Perfect! After this amazing performance by these two legends it was time to leave! :-( But not to worry, I headed back to these guys flat who I met to listen to music, drink some liquid and av it right off! Nice. But unfortunately I had to check out of my hostel at 10.00am so I had to leave having had a pretty amazing night! A bit of a mission getting back but hey, I'm always up for a mission... and a half!
After getting to my hostel and going up to my room some strange stuff started to happen. When I saw my shorts across the other side of the room I couldn't remember why I would have left them there!? when I found a girls dress and a ring burried deep in my bag it started to get weirder - I definitely didn't remember putting those there. As you can probably imagine after being up all night clubbing and arriving back to this weirdness I was pretty confused and
somewhat amused! It turns out that this extremely drunk girl who had completely lost the plot had got confused had been through my rucksack, left some of my clothes around the room, buried her dress deep in my bag, left her pyjamas outside the front door, left some other random stuff around the place, taken my small orange bag from my rucksack which contained chargers for my ipod, camera, phone, and shaver and headed off to new Zealand with it! Perfect! Now if I hadn't just had an amazing night and been in such a joyful, giggly, crazy, mad mood I probably wouldn't have found this as funny as I did. The American girl, Britney, who found that this drunk girl was wearing her hoody in bed did not find it funny at all apparently. Shame I missed that!
I managed to delay my checkout time slightly whilst I looked for my stuff, had a shower and packed my bags. Luckily this cockney girl, (Rachel), in our dorm had this crazy drunk girls, (Catherine - might as well use her name), phone number, and even luckier I would be heading to New Zealand next so would stand a chance
of getting my stuff back. So eventually I checked out, exchanged numbers with Rachel in the hope that she could contact Catherine and headed off into the unknown. Now, having had no sleep I was slightly tired but had nowhere to kip. My original plan was to fall asleep on some grass somewhere but it was raining again so I had one of those days were I don't really know what I did or how I passed the time. Ice cream certainly helped. There's lots of ice cream places in Sydney - Good quality ice cream! I considered doing the 100 dollar ice cream challenge but thought I better save my money for Melbourne. Anyway, at some point during the day I got a text from Rachel - Catherine did have my bag and would be in contact. Perfect strawberries!
And so, after walking around the streets like Moff does at the end of Human Traffic, eating ice cream and a pretty bad lasagne I eventually boarded one of those big long vehicles that automobile experts like to call "a bus". A 12 hour overnight bus journey to Melbourne. Luckily I had a whole seat to my self, my
sleeping bag, a bottle of coke, and a bag of Woolworth's own brand sour worms. Perfect or what!!!
And that was it for Sydney and I have to say... I loved it!
See ya's all later...
Live the life you love... Love the life you live... Sydneyside Up!
Over and Out.
PeterPopper x
P.S - Don't forget to click 'next' at the bottom of the blogs to see the extra page of photo's!
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anonymous
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Ha no way, brings back some fond memories of Sydney. I went to Blue Mountain too! Havent read all your blog thing yet as it is approaching the end of the day, will read the rest when i get home. Did you get any licquorice? They sell amazing licquorice near there. Did you go to Dooleys/Doyleys restaurant in Sydney? think its either in Darling Harbour or Manly. Very nice. Keep up the good blogghing, wish i could be travelling with you, who knows maybe i will win £103,000,000 on the euro millions lottery and come and join you.