Wandering Scotsman

I’ve added more pictures of Sydney and the aquarium. The ones of the marina area are generally the bay I’ve been staying in (the ones with the boats and houses behind).

Within 8 hours I’ll be wakening up and on the ferry across the bay on the way to Sydney airport. Yes, it’s my last few hours in Australia. I’m pleased to say that despite being reluctant to come to such a westernised place after Asia, it’s been a ball. I’ve visited most states, done most of the things I hoped to do, discovered loads more I’d like to do in more remote areas, met at least a dozen mates, and some more from tours here, and spent the best part of, or slightly more than £3k in just over five weeks! Flights, buses, tours, beers, food and more. Yes, staying with mates doesn’t mean you save money at all, it just means you go out to better places, and eat better food. Due to staying at mates and constantly being on the move I’ve never cooked and done the supermarket shopping thing. It’s not a cheap place to cram things into.

I would like to say a huge thanks to all my mates, or their housesitters for making me so welcome. It’s been great to see you all again, it just doesn’t happen enough, and a special thanks to Paul in Sydney who put me up for six nights despite only meeting me on a Whitsundays trip I also have to say a huge thanks to one of his neighbours with the open wireless internet connection – thanks for all the downloads, I just hope I didn’t put you over your monthly bandwidth allowance ;-> Raleigh crowd : great to catch up again. In the last five weeks I’ve almost felt like I have more mates scattered around Australia than I do at home.

It will be interesting how I cope with the weather when I move on as I’ve pretty much had an 8 month summer. I was sitting in Sydney the other night with my fleece on : ‘Is that the same top you wore up Mount Kinabalu?’ ‘erm, yes, but I’m cold’. Apparently it was 25c but it didn’t feel like it.

Next stop New Zealand. Country number 37 I think….

The weather finally broke this morning, the clouds disappeared, the sun came out!  It was off to Coogee just down the coast for the coastal walk to Bondi beach.  My mate Karen and her pal joined me for the 90 minute walk along the coast.  This is a great thing to do here if you want a break from the city – wave battered cliff lined coastlined dotted with small to large surf beaches inbetween, and a few swimming areas or pools sectioned off from the open seas.

We woke up after the walk with a refreshing fight with the waves at Bondi for half an hour – our bodies constantly battered as we tried to bodysurf.

We ended up with some food at the Bondi Icebergs.  From here is was back on a bus, train and ferry (far quicker and easier than it sounds) to get changed, and I’m off to meet Lynne I used to work with years ago for a quiet drink at the Opera bar.

I got out the house today!  Well, around lunchtime….

I finally made it into the city centre then it rained just as I was about to explore the Botanic Gardens! Yes, it seems I brought the bad weather here too.  With that I headed into town and decided to overload myself even more and purchase my Japan guidebook and a couple of DVDs to back up my pictures (exciting blog this eh?).

I had promised myself I would see the aquarium while I was here to see if I liked them more now that I’ve done quite a bit of diving. It was amazing. If you are even slightly interested in the underwater world, definitely visit the aquarium at Darling Harbour during your trip.  There is everything from Yabbies to Crocs to Banana Peel Eels (!?) to coral fish to sharks and rays in many varieties.  I’ve been lucky enough to see quite a bit of the coral sealife during my trip but this place lets you get mesmerised by the motions of jellyfish while not having to worry about passing round them, yet you are still only half a foot away from them.  You can watch sharks, shrimps, turtles, rays and everything else swimming right past your face.  I could have stayed there for ages as I found it absolutely amazing being able to watch all these things without worrying about scaring them away, keeping your bouyancy and fighting currents and all that other stuff you may have to do when diving.

My only question was….if they advocate protecting coral environments etc….where did they get all the coral from?

After that it was off to meet Cath (and her mates) whom I met in Borneo volunteering.  It’s the second person from there I’ve met in Aus and always great to hook up.  We had quite a laugh until the conversation inevitably turned towards what to do ‘after’!  After my second pizza it was time get the ferry back – easy, 20 mins I’d be home.

Although……it turned out I must have been listening to my MP3 player too loudly (note, MP3 player (iAudio), not iPOD, they’re shit!  Everyone’s keeps breaking!)….  when the ferry went under the bridge it made me curious….hmm…must be an extra late night stop.  It kept going in that direction.  When it went back to the other side of the river I decided it was time to get off.  The ferry left on time, it must just be that MY one was the one behind or something.

No worries, there was Darling Harbour, a quick jog round that and I’ll be back at Circular Quay.  I think I must have got off at Balmain East.  Little did I realise how big the proper area of Darling Harbour was.  I only realised this after running down some side streets, turning one corner and probably scaring the shit out of a local girl walking home, creating a longcut back to the main road I was already on. Inlet after inlet got in the way of me getting to the bars and clubs lit up ‘just along the way’. I eventually got up to a main junction and found a taxi :

“If you’re quick, to Circular Quay please, if you’re slow to Mosman South”

In under ten minutes and twenty bucks he made it through the area we were in, across Anzac Bridge and along Darling Harbour to Circular Quay and I dashed through the gates with seconds to spare before the ferry left.  Still, seemed like a nice area I saw!  My twenty minute relaxing journey took an hour – not bad considering!

It’s not always sunny in Sydney! Botanical Gardens during a downpour

 I had an extremely lazy day in Sydney today.  I got up, got online, and never left the apartment until I went out to buy dinner for us around 7.30pm! I had great intentions to do a walk but it was really cloudy and windy so decided to hang loose and catch up on emails, music I’ve (ahem) acquired recently, downloading a few things, and looking at cars for sale and the Great Walks in New Zealand.

After spending the day watching the ferries go by  then getting some food I cooked dinner. The first meal I’ve cooked since June!! (except the odd trip one on project site in Borneo).  We then settled down to challenge each other at online poker over some wine and munchies…which amazingly appeared to fix my laptop speakers that stopped working some time ago.

A great day!  It made me realise how long it had been since I managed to sit down and not do much so it was well overdue!

I’m now in Sydney arriving only a few hours after getting up in Melbourne this morning. Thanks to my new host Paul (who I met on my Whitsundays trip a couple of weeks ago) I made it through the city very quickly from the airport to the quay, then a couple of stops on the ferry to his place. For the third time in Australia (this trip and last) I walked into a friend’s apartment with a hidden key, not having seen them yet.

And look at the view from the dining area :

Anyway, just a quick update as my other mate is coming to pick me up any minute now to go to a travel writing seminar this afternoon then a bbq tonight.