Thursday, April 19, 2007
Despite the severe jetlag, we were all very excited indeed to be in the famous Australia at last. So it is only natural that we wanted to head straight for the most famoud beach in the world: Bondi! After a quick stop off at the Chinese consulate to sort out our visas for China, we drove to Bondi beach. Shauna kindly loaned us her car for the duration of the trip and Nik, the only one with a driver's license, kindly drove us around. Bondi was abit chilly but that didn't stop the girls going in for a dip. I would have joined had my swimming trunks not sadly perished a few weeks previously. One thing that hit us about being in Sydney was the amount of amazing looking food on offer all through the city. Having come from South America we were blinded by the array of Sushi, Thai, Korean and Chinese food on offer. So after Bondi we treated ourselves to a delicious bit of Thai green curry. It was around early evening that we began to really feel the effects of jetlag. However Shauna was determined to keep us up as late as possible to get over the jetlag quickly and so we decided the pub was the best place to try and stay awake.
We met Shauna's housemates and their mates in a pool bar where we had a few "schooners" and some food and shot a few rounds of pool. We were having fun except when 10pm came and Shoz finally allowed us to leave we were back home to our beds faster than you can say Rolf Harris. We had a good night's kip and woke up relatively early to get into town and see a bit of Sydney. After some shopping where I finally replaced my camera we met Shoz and Karin (another mate from Andrews) for lunch. When Shoz went back to work Karin took us to the opera house and a ferry tour of the harbour ending up at Darling Harbour for some pints. We indulged in the national dish of Australia - potato wedges with sour cream and sweet chilli sauce - but then the dreaded jetlag caught up with us again. On the Wednesday we met Craig, a friend of Fi's who she met in Munich 4 years ago. We drove to Manley beach and had a fantastic day of swimming, bodysurfing and sunbathing but not before I bought a fly pair of Billabong swimming shorts.
Later in the day we went for a walk by the rocks and ended up on a cliff with a beautiful view of Manley beach where we watched the sun go down. Later on in the evening we had our first kebab in 4 months and man was it good! Next we were on our way down to Karin's place in Coogee to meet some more of the Andrews contingent who was over here. We had a bit of craic over a few brewskies with Craig dazzling us all with his guitar skills. We left early enough though as the girls were up at the crack of dawn for sky diving which is something you want to be neither hungover nor tired for. Besides we still hadn't quite shaken the jetlag. While the girls were doing their dive, I was posted to admin duty. Every now and again during our travels we need to do things like book accommodation for our next few destinations, book flights, research tours etc... We call this admin duty and as it is incredibly boring and tedious we tend to put aside a morning for it and blitz it. And so it was that I found myself spending the day with a computer and trying to organise the next few months of our lives. That evening we went to town to meet Karin and Andrew for dinner. This ended up happening with a good deal more people than orginally intended and as such we didn't make it to a restaurant until close to midnight. Still it was a good night with more catching up with the Andrews crowd.
For our final day in Sydney we decided to get to grips with the flora and fauna of the country, 70% of which is indigenous to Australia apparently. In the morning we headed for a nearby koala reserve which, despite its name, hosts an array of animals from koalas to kangaroos to wallabies to possums to wombats to dingos to quite a rude speaking parrot. Every animal, with the exception of the emus, was incredibly cute and we spent a longer time there than originally intended oohing and aahing. We were even allowed to pet the kangaroos in the walk-in pen. For the afternoon we headed to the famous Sydney aquarium. It was brill. A massive array of marine life of which Australia has the best in the world. But also the tanks were large and very clean and the whole setup is very impressive. The highlights included a trip to the seal sanctuary and walking under the water of the shark pool. After the aquarium the girls headed to Sydney harbour bridge for a bridge climb. Being slightly outside my budget I decided to opt out and after this internet session I'll be heading back to Shauna's to get a head start on the BBQ pool party scheduled for tonight. Then it's off to Melbourne first thing in the morning. It's all go go go!
We met Shauna's housemates and their mates in a pool bar where we had a few "schooners" and some food and shot a few rounds of pool. We were having fun except when 10pm came and Shoz finally allowed us to leave we were back home to our beds faster than you can say Rolf Harris. We had a good night's kip and woke up relatively early to get into town and see a bit of Sydney. After some shopping where I finally replaced my camera we met Shoz and Karin (another mate from Andrews) for lunch. When Shoz went back to work Karin took us to the opera house and a ferry tour of the harbour ending up at Darling Harbour for some pints. We indulged in the national dish of Australia - potato wedges with sour cream and sweet chilli sauce - but then the dreaded jetlag caught up with us again. On the Wednesday we met Craig, a friend of Fi's who she met in Munich 4 years ago. We drove to Manley beach and had a fantastic day of swimming, bodysurfing and sunbathing but not before I bought a fly pair of Billabong swimming shorts.
Later in the day we went for a walk by the rocks and ended up on a cliff with a beautiful view of Manley beach where we watched the sun go down. Later on in the evening we had our first kebab in 4 months and man was it good! Next we were on our way down to Karin's place in Coogee to meet some more of the Andrews contingent who was over here. We had a bit of craic over a few brewskies with Craig dazzling us all with his guitar skills. We left early enough though as the girls were up at the crack of dawn for sky diving which is something you want to be neither hungover nor tired for. Besides we still hadn't quite shaken the jetlag. While the girls were doing their dive, I was posted to admin duty. Every now and again during our travels we need to do things like book accommodation for our next few destinations, book flights, research tours etc... We call this admin duty and as it is incredibly boring and tedious we tend to put aside a morning for it and blitz it. And so it was that I found myself spending the day with a computer and trying to organise the next few months of our lives. That evening we went to town to meet Karin and Andrew for dinner. This ended up happening with a good deal more people than orginally intended and as such we didn't make it to a restaurant until close to midnight. Still it was a good night with more catching up with the Andrews crowd.
For our final day in Sydney we decided to get to grips with the flora and fauna of the country, 70% of which is indigenous to Australia apparently. In the morning we headed for a nearby koala reserve which, despite its name, hosts an array of animals from koalas to kangaroos to wallabies to possums to wombats to dingos to quite a rude speaking parrot. Every animal, with the exception of the emus, was incredibly cute and we spent a longer time there than originally intended oohing and aahing. We were even allowed to pet the kangaroos in the walk-in pen. For the afternoon we headed to the famous Sydney aquarium. It was brill. A massive array of marine life of which Australia has the best in the world. But also the tanks were large and very clean and the whole setup is very impressive. The highlights included a trip to the seal sanctuary and walking under the water of the shark pool. After the aquarium the girls headed to Sydney harbour bridge for a bridge climb. Being slightly outside my budget I decided to opt out and after this internet session I'll be heading back to Shauna's to get a head start on the BBQ pool party scheduled for tonight. Then it's off to Melbourne first thing in the morning. It's all go go go!
# posted by Grum @ 10:55 PM 
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