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| Morning View from our Hotel Room |
Woke up early this morning and had coffee and a light breakfast in our room, enjoying the incredible view. We saw a Royal Caribbean cruise ship pull into the harbor, right between the Opera House and the Bridge. Just can’t get away from those cruise ships.
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| The Beautiful Royal Botanic Gardens |
Anyway, we began our day with a walk. We walked a couple of blocks, then down an outdoor stairway, onto a waterfront boulevard and up some more stairs and we found ourselves in the Royal Botanic Gardens, and they were beautiful. With both the city and harbor serving as backdrops, the plant and bird life was amazing. We even saw bats – lots of them – flying overhead and hanging in trees. Really quite beautiful.
We then left the park and caught the HOHO bus for our grand tour of Sydney and Bondi Beach. As always, riding atop a double decker bus is fun. Taking in the views from this vantage point is different from any other view – and Sydney provided great sights – including beautiful buildings both old and new. Our first stop was the Sydney Fish Market – the second largest fish market in the world. It was a bit underwhelming in that we couldn’t really gauge the size of the market as most of it was a bit locked off from the public. However, we did purchase some sushi and a scallop mornay from a shop there and sat down to enjoy it at a waterfront table. The sushi was great, and the scallop was tasty, but a bit overpriced for what they gave you.
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| City View from the HoHo Bus |
We then re-joined the bus and completed our tour of Sydney, then hopped on the Bondi Beach route. This tour took us through several suburbs and beach towns. Bondi Beach was amazing! It is a huge cove with a large crescent shaped beach, and today, Sunday, it was filled with people. We were planning on getting off and walking around Bondi, but it took us a while to get there (beach traffic) and then with the sheer volume of people there, we decided to take in the sight, snap some pictures and move on. The bus then drove through a few fairly beautiful and snazzy beach communities – Rose Bay and Double Bay – sort of like Del Mar and La Jolla in San Diego. Very nice, although both seemed a bit snooty. The tour guide advised us to look out for the fancy cars people like to show off in.
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| Sydney - Old & New |
The bus finally returned to Sydney and we got off in China Town. Walked just a few blocks before we came to the East Ocean Restaurant where we had a little dim sum and Joanie had some Chinese broccoli with oyster sauce. She loved it and scarfed it down while I nibbled on my pork buns.
Then back on our bus to return to our hotel – ending our long, beautiful and interesting tour of Sydney. We certainly saw a lot of this city in one day, and we took in the sights a bit more from our hotel window as we enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine.
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| Beautiful but Insane Bondi Beach |
After sunset, we walked down the street to the Opium Den – a Thai restaurant where we had dinner. The food was delicious, the (BYO) wine was great and it served as a very relaxing way to end our big day in Sydney.
I think Joanie and I both would agree that, if you like big cities, you would love Sydney. It seemed pretty clean for its size, with lots to do, good transportation options and in beautiful surroundings. We had a truly lovely time here.
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| Cheers Sydney |
