Sydney...Round Two

We had a "field trip" scheduled for Sydney this weekend. I was a little concerned because I had been sick all week with a cold and sinus infection. On the plus side, I had the most fantastic colors of green coming from my nose. I bought a box of cold and flu stuff and ended up going through the whole box in the 3 days I was there...it helped a lot though, I felt fine for the most part.

We took the 8:22 train out of Newcastle, which put us in Sydney at 11:30 or so. We caught a train/bus combination to Bondi Beach. (Apparently, there is a popular Aussie TV show called "Bondi Rescue" that takes place on this beach. I've seen commercials for it, and from everything I can discern, it's a real-life Baywatch, only with much less slow motion running.) We had lunch and walked around and took in the sights...I thought it was absolutely gorgeous.























We wandered into a surf shop to discover a 30% off of everything sale. Nate bought a wetsuit top, and I bought a wetsuit and board shorts (The swimsuit I bought was a little large...not really an issue in the treacherous waters of Wisconsin, but in the ocean waves, I've found my suit around my knees more than once.)

We headed back and checked into our hostel around 6PM. The girls took a while getting ready, and then we met Catherine to buy her dinner. (Catherine is our program director...we meet with her once a week, she arranged our housing and the field trip and she takes care of lots of little issues that we run into along the way.) We wandered around Circular Quay for awhile before settling on the Opera House Bar and Grill, which is on the concourse in the shadows of Australia's two most famous landmarks. The downside to this is that my 12oz steak and 4 onion rings cost me $29. (I resisted the urge to tell the staff that they can tell "their so-called 'chef' that I have personally grilled better sirloin than this...and I am an idiot!" We were all very tired from a long day, and I was not feeling great and we ended up going back to the hostel early and falling asleep early.

We met Catherine at Pier 6 in the harbour early the next morning to tackle the next big thing.





We had a Harbour Bridgeclimb scheduled. Ordinarily, it will cost you around $200 to climb it, it was included in our program costs.

The climb itself was pretty cool. The entryway was lined with autographed celebrity photos of those who climbed before...Robert DeNiro, Matt Damon, Will Smith, lots of American actors. The whole affair took about three hours. Upon arriving, you are breathalyzed and release forms are signed. Then, you are outfitted in a one piece jumpsuit. You are not allowed to bring anything up....no hair ties, bobby-pins, watches, cameras, wallets, nothing. Anything they give you to bring up is tethered to your suit. Handkerchief attached to right wrist. Fleece sewed into a bag attached to left hip. Headset attached to back of neck leading to radio attached to back of belt. Had it been raining, there would have been a rain shell attached to the right hip. Sunglasses were clipped into holders and attached to the back of the neck as well. They had hats and gloves available if you wanted them. The headsets were interesting...rather than projecting into the ears, they sat on the bones between the temple and ears. When the climb leader spoke, it sounded like the voice was in your head. It got LOUDER if you covered your ears. Also, it's very difficult to talk to someone else with a voice in your head. (I know some people who have perfected this, my brother comes to mind)

Finally, it was time to go. We were attached to the bridge by means of short bungie harness, running from the front of the belt to a cable that started on one side of the bridge, went all the way up to the top along walkways, across the top, and back down. (All of this was only bracketed onto the bridge...one of the conditions that bridge climb be allowed to open is that they didn't modify the bridge at all. If they were to go broke, the climb cables could be removed and the HQ they drilled out re-filled with concrete and it would be like they were never there)

The climb was not very stressful, gentle slope for the most part with ladders interspersed. These were originally maintenance pathways, and as such were rickety in places, or a tight squeeze with low headroom in other places. We were under the bridge for awhile, then went over the water with nothing but mesh and several hundred feet of air between us and the ocean, and then came up between lanes of traffic and climbed the lower arch all the way to the peak, where ladders took us to the upper arch.

The view was spectacular, but, of course, we were not allowed cameras. They were happy to take my picture with their camera, however, and sell it to me later. How nice of them!



We crossed the top and went down the opposite leg, going down between train tracks this time. Several trains rumbled by while we were either between the tracks or directly underneath...pretty cool.

After we got off the bridge I snapped some pictures of downtown Sydney from the road deck.













After this, we got lunch at The Australian Hotel. They had over 100 different Australian beers. I sampled three different tasty stouts and had a Peppered Kangaroo pizza...mmmm. We then walked to the Opera House for our 4pm tour.

Here's the bridge from the Opera House...seems like a very daunting task to walk all the way around the harbour and up to the top! Little did I know that was only a fraction of the dozens of miles I'm sure I walked this weekend...




The tour itself...was worthwhile, because we got to see inside. I was dissappointed because it was mostly just watching different videos and we didn't get to see all the chambers, and the cool looking ones were photography prohibited inside. This is my favorite room, I wasn't allowed to photograph it myself :(



I did get some nifty shots of the hallways and lounges though. It was definitely worth going. (I also learned a lot :))






















Even the parking garage was pretty!




After this, we walked BACK across the harbour to the rocks to go to a pub for a bit. I took a second out of my walk to take the prettiest picture I have ever taken in my life.





We went to a German pub that had all German beers on tap...and different glasses for every beer! I thought all the glasses looked cool.





It was still early in the evening. We walked back home, I had a kangaroo kebab on the way (vowing to start a kangaroo diet). We got ready and headed out to have a couple drinks. We ended up walking BACK to the rocks. On the way, we debated entering a nightclub, but decided against it because of the $15 cover. Later that night, somebody would get stabbed on the sidewalk very near where we decided to keep walking. Makes you think.

After a few drinks we walked BACK home...witnessing a taxi getting rear ended on the way. I was waiting to cross the street and some idiot slides into this cab. That was kinda cool, actually.

Sunday, the girls headed home. Three of our friends came up from Newcastle for the day. Nate and I stayed with them all day...we walked around some of the shops, had some pretty shady, authentic chinese food, and then went to the pylon lookout museum, which is part of the bridge. The top of the pylon is not as tall as the bridge, but still very tall, and you can take your cameras up here. It's 9.50 to get in, unless you have a bridge climb receipt, in which case it's free.

Here are some more nifty pictures I took from the bridge.





Here's Billy, checking out the view.
























We are high up.



On my first trip to Sydney, I took a picture of the Harbour Bridge from Olympic park. This is Olympic park from the Harbour bridge!






That's...a rock...with a face on it...on a car...in the middle of a roundabout. I wouldn't have noticed it without the telephoto.



















Traffic on the bridge. It is the busiest stretch of road in the world, something like 200,000 cars, buses and trains a DAY! It used to be four lanes in the middle, and they were repainted to six...very narrow. Take notice of the bus on the right side of the picture...busses are only allowed in that lane because if two busses were in adjacent lanes, their mirrors would touch! The two leftmost lanes were formerly tram lanes and then were converted to traffic lanes.




We walked to Darling Harbour and watched the sun set while eating at a pub and drinking Guinness. It was a very good weekend. I walked back to Central and hopped on a train home.













I mentioned ALL THAT walking? Every time we left the hostel, it was 1.8 miles to the harbour. That's 3.6 miles round trip, two trips per day, walking around at the harbour....I wouldn't be surprised if I walked over 35 miles the three days I was there.