Sydney

We spent the last week in Bondi Beach, a suburb of Sydney … about half an hour away from the harbour and the opera house. The apartment we rented was perfect. Bright, spacious, only a block away from the beach and in a great neighborhood with groceries, cafes, restaurants, all only a few feet from the front door. While we heard about Bondi Beach being hopelessly crowded in the summer, it was pretty empty this time of year. Of course Bondi is famous for surfing and, even though we don’t surf, it’s easy to see why. The waves here are incredibly regular … just one rolling in after the next. We spent a while watching some local kids go to “surf school” and, if we’d live here, we would sign Lara up for lessons right away 😉

The weather reminded us of a beautiful fall day in California … while the sun shone almost every day, it was cool enough to wear sweaters in the afternoon and evenings. It might sound strange, but it was so nice to get out of the heat for a week!

After a day of not doing much at all, we took the bus downtown and caught the ferry to the Sydney zoo (before kids, the zoo was never high on our list of things to see … but that sure changed). As the ferry left the dock, we got our first glimpse of the famous opera house … and both of us were surprised how small it is. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a beautiful building and looks different from every angle, but it’s nowhere as enormous as it appears in the pictures that we saw before coming here.

The zoo was very very nice (we’d rate it just below the one in San Diego) and you can easily spend a full day without getting bored. The bird and seal shows were pretty impressive, but (as always) the kids liked the lions best. It was a very relaxing day, just wandering between the animals and admiring the Sydney skyline in the distance.

On Friday we went to the mall shopping to replenish our clothing supply (we had given away quite a bit away in Samoa and Fiji). As always when we go shopping together, it was a pretty unpleasant experience … to say the least. The kids (and I) get bored after a few minutes and poor Anna has to drag us from one store to the next. I hate faceless malls and much prefer to buy all my cloths online … but that wasn’t an option here. Needless to say, we were all happy when we got back to our apartment for Finn’s afternoon nap.

The next day we walked to one of the neighboring beaches, watched the surfers and enjoyed a long lunch at a cafe while the kids played in the sand. So much more fun than visiting an endless stream of stores that seem exactly the same wherever you go in the world!

The weekend was a long one (Monday was Queen’s birthday) and we went downtown to see the botanic garden. It’s famous for the thousands of bats (actually flying foxes) and the endless stream flying out of the park at dusk is indeed pretty impressive. The point across Farm Cove is the classic viewpoint and we spent an hour there watching the sun set behind the opera house and harbour bridge. After dark the opera was lit in different color patterns (part of the “Vivid Sydney” festival) and it was pretty cool to see them change every few minutes.

On our last day we went downtown to the fish market and enjoyed it a lot. Oysters, sashimi, crabs … all with a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc at lunch … what more can you ask for 😉

Overall it was a great week, and just fun to be in a city again after so many islands and beaches. Having said that, it’s off to Bali in a few hours.

Here are my pictures from the week.