Sydneyside

I didn't expect to like Sydney as much as I did. It's actually been one of my favourite places so far. We ended up staying in an area called Glebe, recommended by Annie's eldest daughter Gemma. If I could live anywhere in Sydney, it'd be there. Lots of little independent cafes, bakeries, delis, bookshops. A fun market on Saturdays, a decent shopping centre and supermarket nearby, gorgeous houses, close to the river. It could have been a warmer, more chilled out version of some parts of London. In fact, we were often struck by how London-like some parts of Sydney seemed, with their terraced houses, tree-lined streets, corner shops and the odd pub. It helped that it was sometimes grey and rainy. Quite often, I found myself thinking I'd consider moving there if only it wasn't on the other side of the world from home.

After a couple of weeks of farmwork, we were ready to be tourists again. We dropped into the National Maritime Museum and had some fun nosing around an old navy ship.

Karl plays shooting

I like this poster. The smaller text says "SOS Save Our Secrets"

And exploring a submarine.

Uhm, Karl...can you hear ticking?

We saw the very impressive Sydney Harbour Bridge. I do like a good bridge.

Me & Bridge

We saw the Opera House from a distance, and weren't too impressed. I'd expected something majestic and white, but it looked a bit off-colour, kind of beige. The grey skies didn't do it any favours:

Five minutes later we'd walked up to inspect it more closely and I took all of this back. This is what it looks like up close, and this is why it's a bit beige.

I had no idea it was so prettily patterned.

From here we took a nice long stroll through the city, through the botanic gardens and past the national library and history museum, both very nice buildings. What I particularly enjoyed were the cast iron statues of noble figures which were dotted around the city, and which had been 'dressed up' as part of a city-wide exhibition.

Including this finely adorned beast:

Apparently this was a gift from the Italians to the Australians.

I'm not sure exactly what it's supposed to symbolise.

It has a shiny nose because there's a sign saying that if you chuck a few pennies in the pool and rub it's nose while making a wish, it'll come true. It's amazing how many people, regardless of whether they actually believe it or not, will actually do things like this. I am one of them. Karl is not.

Sight-seeing is hungry work, so we stopped off at Harry's Cafe de Wheels for some pie:

Mmm pie...

Instead of spending a full week in the city, we decided to head just outside Sydney to a town called Katoomba to see the Blue Mountains. To get there, we took our first ever journey on a double-decker train, which was pretty exciting for all of five minutes, after which it just seems like a normal train.

We did a four hour walk (nothing taxing, just a long, leisurely stroll) between the various lookout points. It was a clear, blue-skied day so the views were incredible:

The blue that gives the mountains their name is from a blue haze emitted by the thick forest of eucalyptus trees that grows over them. And here's an interesting thing – while in the UK many of our trees shed their leaves in Autumn, in Australia some trees shed their bark each year. The bark just sort of peels off, it looks really strange:

We saw a cool formation of rocks called the Three Sisters. The story is that two rival, aboriginal tribes once lived there. Three sisters from one tribe had fallen in love with three men from the other, but weren't allowed to marry them. The three guys decided to take matters into their own hands and tried to take them by force. This led to a battle between the two tribes, during which the sisters were turned into rocks by a magician to prevent them from being stolen. But the magician died during the fight, so they were never turned back. All of which I'm sure is definitely true.

The old girls

We also walked down the Giant Stairway, which is 900 steps. We had wobbly knees by the time we reached the bottom.

There was no way we were going back up it, so we walked for half an hour or so to the so-called Scenic Railway to get a little train back to the top of the hill. There was nothing scenic about this railway. We went backwards at a very steep angle (definitely over 45degrees) past rocks and through darkness. We were practically vertical – if I'd dropped the sandwich I was eating, it would have landed on the head of the guy in front of me. The ride cost $11 and lasted for all of 2 minutes.

We consoled ourselves with coffee and cake at a nice cafe, before ordering pizza from Dominoes (who had a Cheap Tuesdays offer on that evening) and lounging around in front of the fire at our hostel with some box wine we'd found on the 'Free' shelf. All in all, it proved to be a pretty satisfying day.

Pizza: Before & After

Two days later we were off to New Zealand.