Sydney, take one

The Sydney Tower, with a bar and restaurant at the top. It is very, very tall, and you can see the whole city from up there. (I later discovered it is not as tall as the Macau Tower, which I visited later on in my travels)

Although I thought it was a bit ridiculous at first to do Sydney in 3 different stints, for 2 days at a time each, I am actually pretty happy with that arrangement now. I spent a lovely day in Sydney yesterday and am now looking forward to Cairns, and returning to Sydney in 2 weeks.

Another plus for hostels is the marketing of cheap and free entertainment, and tours. I went on a free 3 hour walking tour of the city, and was able to see a lot of the city, understand where stuff is a little bit (and that my crap hostel is actually not horribly, horribly located), and learn some cool history about the place. After the tour, on the advice of my hostel friends from the night before, I took a ferry to Manly, a cute little beach suburb, and walked around the Manly beaches. Got to see the pacific ocean again so that was neat :).

Behind me is the Harbor Bridge, on a beautiful day in Sydney. You can walk across it, or climb to the top of it.

I sat on the beach for awhile, and started to read "In a Sunburned Country" by Bill Bryson. Its an incredibly entertaining book. What really made it for me was when he was talking about the jellyfish, I think "bluebottles" that were swimming around him when he was boogie boarding (on or near the beach I was on) I heard an announcement from the lifeguard stands asking people to get out of the water because bluebottles were around, and reminding them that the extreme pain from a sting would last at least an hour, and there was no cure. As calmly as if they were announcing the morning weather report. What a place.

This is the Sydney Opera House. To give you an idea of the area, the Harbor Bridge was behind me when I took the picture, the ferries are to the right, and Manly is about a half hour ferry ride behind the Opera House

I lingered in Manly, and ended up eating dinner there at a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant and bar, where I was introduced to chicken schnitzel, which if I recall is chicken breaded and deep fried. Its excellent. After returning from Manly, I ended up walking back to the hostel. It was a good long walk through the city, and because it was rush hour, lots of people were walking around going home from work. It was another good way to kind of figure out my way around.

I am excited to go to Cairns to scuba and see all the cool stuff they have around there, but I am also looking forward to coming back to Sydney and seeing even more of the city. Its a huge place, and even though I got a taste of it, I know I need to spend more time here and see more.