One more city in us

    

Sydney.  Another city that made us wonder if maybe we were 5 years younger, or Canadian with the ability to get some commonwealth work visa thingy, or if perhaps we found some sort of a work placement situation – could we live here?  At the moment (from our Bangkok hotel room, as I’m a little behind on my bloggage), I’m thinking yes.  Between Melbourne and Sydney, we’ve both been swept away by these two Ozian sites and as I whispered to Steve as were we wandering around, “I kinda wish we had one more city in us.”  Don’t get me wrong on two accounts – we are 1.) not picking up and moving to Australia any time soon and 2.) ruling out the possibility of living somewhere other than Vancouver before we’re retired, but being in such great cities/potential and liveable homes, sure does make you think.

Because we have been flying for over 12 hours today, and because I’m a bit of a wimpy traveler sitting in a Bangkok hotel having shied away from hitting the town the moment we got in (as much as I’m craving some pad thai right now as I drift off to sleep, I think it’d be best to save the shock of our first Asian city for when we’ve had a proper night’s sleep) – I’ll keep this recap of Sydney brief and photographic.  I know we said we’d be focusing more on one or two things that stand out in this blog, but honestly, the journaller in me (not journalist) loves the sequential sharing that comes with traveling.

So…Sydney highlights:

      Our airbnb.com pad that was nestled in the funky, Brooklyn-esque neighbourhood of Erskineville.  Our host was on a retreat the entire time we were there, so we had the place to ourselves (as long as we fed her 3 cats):

A   A wander through the University of Sydney of which the design is based on Oxford and we’re told houses many informal Harry Potter conventions (does this architecture ring any bells?  Perhaps from this post: Just Came Down From Oawxsford Dahling?):

?

     The initial downtown approach – it’s a wild feeling to come up out of a train station (first photo below) to realize you’re staring at something you’ve only ever seen in photos.  Yes, we rocked the tourist shots and worked the camera at every angle:

 Lolli-gagging through the oldest area of town known as “the Rocks” imagining the first European settlers coming across this amazing place and saying, “Uh…how about we set up camp here?”

 
      Finding a micro-brewery at one of the oldest pubs in Sydney and sampling the goods while having some fish and chips (apparently, a real “must eat” in Oz…who knew?)

       Enjoying an incredible midsummer night’s sunset from a lookout we stumbled upon:

      The highly recommended 6K walk from Bondi Beach to Coogee Beach.  With several reapplications of sunscreen (we were the palest Canucks around), endless photo ops, and a picnic lunch – our day in the sun left us with healthy freckles and a memorable 3 hours (notice Steve waving in the direction of North America – hi family and friends!):

      Token “make your own iced beverage” while bumming around downtown waiting to meet up with friends (thanks Mike and Hayley for the wonderful tour, dinner, and chats!).   I’m getting good at this, readers.

     
      The discovery of an old favourite childhood book – The Adventures of Snugglepot and Cuddlepie (we saw real live, scary Bansky men when we were wandering through the university the day before):

      And the biggest surprise of all – a sky filled with bats!  There are colonies of bats who live in the Botanical Gardens by day, and by night fill the sky in search of food (mainly berries, no humans).  Notice the upside down little eyes in the photo – and the video of the sky.  We were surprised that we’d never read anything about the city’s bat population.

What an amazing first part of our trip!  Hard to believe it’s already been two weeks and one country down – but what an incredible first part it was!  Thanks to Joel, Tanja, Otto, Ruth, Ray, Mike, and Hayley for making us feel so welcome in the land of Oz.  Thank you, also, to our great Airbnb hosts, Loren, Ruth, and Ria – your homes made us feel all the more at home. 

We’re both a little nervous and excited about the next step of our journey, but stay tuned and we’ll let you know how we do…