10/3/11 – Sydney, Australia
We are here! AUSTRALIA! We woke up nice and early to watch the entire sail in to where we docked at Circular Quay. Although very grey, rainy and cold, it was still beautiful. We were so excited to be in Sydney that a little rain could not damper our joyous moods. As we walked down the gangplank, Tommy and I held hands and took our first step onto Australian land together with a bit of a squeal from me and whoop from Tommy. The couples around us laughed at our excitement. The sun broke through warming it up a bit, and we went in search of our hotel that we are moving into tomorrow for the next two weeks. For some reason we were convinced our hotel was on Kent street, a few blocks down from where it was actually located, so we ended up winding up and down the streets in between Circular Quay and Darling Harbor. Getting lost was a good way to explore the city! Our hotel is in an AWESOME location, just a block away from George Street (a very popular street in Sydney), and half a block from Max Brenners. It is very important that we are close to Max Brenners because it is the most phenomenal chocolate bar in the world, and I do not doubt that many trips will be made there for chocolate treats and yummy drinks.
We got back on the ship for lunch to avoid using our money for one last day before setting off again to explore...it is okay if you are calling us cheap right now, we are proud of it! Manly was our destination of choice after being told by an Aussie couple on board that a Jazz Festival was going on there for the day. Today is actually a public holiday in Australia, their labor day, so it started to get pretty crowded with people coming in to visit for a long weekend. We took the 30-minute ferry to Manly, and Tommy absolutely fell in love. He had already fallen in love with Sydney, but after visiting Manly, he was determined for us to find an apartment there, and I definitely would not be opposed to that idea! Manly is a relaxed beach town with volleyball nets lining the beach, and surfers taking over the water. Of course we had to have our first taste of some of their local beer, so we found a great bar with a spot by the fire to warm us up. We ended up meeting a very nice couple who lived in Manly, and the guy ended up buying Tommy a Coopers beer! We are good at making the right friends!
(On the ferry to Manly)
(Manly Wharf)
Tonight is our last night on this ship, which is a bit bitter sweet, but we are ready for the next part of our adventure. Packing is NOT fun, and somehow my bag is already more stuffed than when I began, and I did not even buy anything along the way…not sure how that worked out, but I am going to need a car just for my bags at this point!
Our new Aussie life starts today!!! We disembarked with our trolley full of luggage, and arrived at the Menzies Hotel, our new home for the next 13 days. After putting together a list of things to do, we headed out, and made it only 5 minutes before ducking into the McDonald’s to use their free WI-FI. When in Australia, go to McDonalds? We tried to get the majority of our errands started today, but ended up giving in the lure of the city and set off exploring. We enjoyed a nice afternoon snack and two Aussie beers at a great spot right under the Sydney Opera House with the best view of the bridge and our ship. As the sun set behind the bridge, the deep horn of the Volendam signified the end of one chapter of our journey, and the beginning of our new one in Sydney. 
Today has been great, but unsuccessful of getting our “to-do” list done. We originally planned to grab some breakfast and take a nice walk around the Botanical Gardens Park before starting our day. Well 5 and a half hours later we are finally back to the hotel from our walk… We ended up grabbing a great breakfast under the Wynyard Station before heading through Circular Quay to the park. The park walk was gorgeous along the harbor coastline, taking us an hour to get up to Hyde Park. We found a park bench to sit on and enjoy the atmosphere with a great guitar player strumming by the fountain. We walked to the end of the rectangular Hyde Park, and found a war memorial exhibition to walk through called the ANZAC Memorial. On our way back towards our hotel, we zigzagged up the different streets to get a taste of the different areas, and found ourselves in the middle of Chinatown, pretty easily distinguishable when we realized we could not read the names of the different stores anymore as it was all Chinese symbols and we were the only white people on the crowded streets. We cut over to George St., which ran us into the Victoria Building. The Queen Victoria Building is a great indoor 4-story building with shops and food, with a ceiling made out of glass to let the sunshine through making it feel like you are in an outdoor mall. We found a great place to grab a delicious pizza for lunch before going back to the hotel. On our way back to the hotel we passed by an Apple Store, and thought we would just go in for a few minutes to check our email on their demo computers, and ended up spending an hour there! I think you know you are desperate when you use the Apple Stores computers to get your emails, Facebook and apartment hunting taken care of… I used to always make fun of the people I would see in Apple Stores using the computers for their personal business, and here I was on the other side, one of those people!
After hitting up some brekkie at the same spot, we already are considering ourselves regulars here (haha), we headed back to the McDonalds to take advantage of their testy but free Wi-Fi. How much more desperate can we get! We were met with A LOT of frustration when we were continuously logged out every 5 minutes, so we decided to come up with a better option. One of my contacts over here had just emailed me mentioning a public library, so we located the State Library of New South Wales on our map us tourists carry around with us, and headed to the library only 6 blocks up from our hotel, bordering the Royal Botanical Gardens. As much as we want to be exploring Sydney, we realize it is more important to find an apartment first so that we do not arrive back from our cruise and realize that we are homeless and must find a nice street bench to live on. So, we spent 5 long hours in the library before our brains just about exploded and our eyes watered from staring at a screen for too darn long. Unfortunately, after 30+ inquiries were sent out, the only responses we received were that the apartments were already leased. Just our luck... Finding an apartment is a bit harder than we expected, especially with summer rolling around the corner, and people moving to the beaches for the summer months, the beaches that we are trying to find an apartment in! Wish us better luck for tomorrow.
Today we were focused on at least one of us setting up an Australian phone. After finding out that it was required to have an Australian bank account set up prior to activating a phone, we got some information and thought about our different options before spending another few hours researching apartments online. When we finally felt we were deserving of a break, we walked to The Rocks for their Friday food market. A small line of venders set up like a Farmer’s Market were lined up two blocks with delicious foods: ice cream, nuts, oils and vinegars, cupcakes, wraps, sushi, sausages, etc. We split a great rosemary and lamb sausage roll with caramelized onions, but of course only after trying some cookies and cream cupcakes. Dessert comes first right? Delicious to say the least! Tommy was already planning our future trips back, pointing out the bread, fruit and egg prices, and his idea to come every Friday to do our grocery shopping once we were living in an apartment, very cute.
After an hour in the bank, and an hour and a half in Vodafone, both closing while we were the last customers inside, Tommy had his bank account and phone set up, putting us one step closer to finding an apartment, and transforming us from tourists into locals! As a celebration, we headed to Bovarian Bier Cafe, a German restaurant that is currently celebrating Oktoberfest. When we first got off the ship in Sydney, Tommy immediately saw a sign on the back of one of the public buses advertizing Bovarian Bier Cafe, and of course decided we HAD to go there! You think Tommy likes beer? Well I have to say I am thrilled that he had his “beer goggles” on because the restaurant turned out to be awesome. The capital for Oktoberfest is Bovaria, and we lucked out with having a waitress who was from Bovaria! She helped us order the best German food and beers, allowing us to have a very delicious experience in this fun bar! With our huge beer glasses in hand we raised them to a great night with the men in their lederhosen pounding out German notes on their instruments behind us. It was a loud, fun and exciting environment, marking a great end to a busy day!
We returned to the city satisfied, and headed straight to The Rocks for the food/flea market that is held every Saturday and Sunday. As we wandered through the different vendors, I could not help but follow the whooping cheers echoing off the walls. The sounds led me to a packed Irish bar, beer flowing left and right at 3pm in the afternoon, full of people watching the Ireland vs. Wales rugby game. How could we resist grabbing a beer and joining in on the excitement! Unfortunately Ireland lost, but we left before that occurred, probably a smart idea. The next game, England vs. Scotland, we watched in a bar called 333 just a block down from our hotel, and once again the team we were cheering for (England) lost. So I am now thinking that Tommy and I should not cheer for Australia tomorrow because maybe we are bad luck… NAH! AUSSIE AUSSIE AUSSIE, OY OY OY!
Calories were flying high this morning after dining at Pancakes on the Rocks. The Banana Rama (a stack of buttermilk pancakes topped with cream, a scoop of vanilla ice cream, caramelized bananas, and drizzled with homemade butterscotch) and Choco Supreme Surprise (a stack of buttermilk pancakes smothered in cream, ice cream, chocolate sauce, bananas, and walnuts) settled nicely into our tummies. We made use of our week long transportation passes, hopping on the bus from Circular Quay to Coogee. We lucked out with a gorgeous day, and after visiting a few rental agencies, we began the four-mile costal walk from Coogee to Bondi. I know I have been using a lot of Australian place names to describe our experiences, so I hope you are all pulling out a map as you read my blogs, but if not, Coogee and Bondi are both beach towns, connected by a gorgeous boardwalk that twists and turns around the coast, harboring two other beaches, Bronte and Tamarama, between the two. It took us just under an hour and a half to walk the two switching between power walking, strolling and pausing to take pictures. Coogee is about a third the size of Bondi, making it a great family spot, but Bondi is a better spot for young people to live. Tons of bars, cafes and shops line the streets, and a great Sunday flea market took over a few blocks. We would have loved to stay in Bondi all day, but we wanted to get back to the city for the Australia vs. South Africa rugby game. We arrived at a fun bar just in time for the start of the game, and 4 beers and many cheers later, Australia deserved their great victory over the Springboks! I guess we are not bad luck after all! The New Zealand vs. Argentina game followed the Australian victory, and we spotted #9, a Samoan beast who plays for the All Blacks (New Zealand). The reason we were looking out for him was actually because we just happened to meet his 7 year old son in Apia, Samoa swimming in the ocean with us. Pretty cool!
Tonight we are finally meeting Eric Braun, the man who has helped us SO much with our move to Australia, providing us with endless information over many emails and Skype conversations. He is actually an American who moved to Australia 20 years or so ago, and never returned. He also just happens to be a Bucknell alumnus who graduated 40 years ago! Eric offered to store a few pieces of our luggage in his apartment while we travel to New Zealand, and we must have been quite the spectacle to see, sprinting down the streets of Sydney with our bags in tow, my roller often flying ahead of me and almost knocking a few people over, trying to catch the 8:30pm ferry. Of course when we showed up to the ferry at 8:28pm panting and dripping sweat, we found out the ferry did not leave until 8:45pm… ARE YOU KIDDING ME!
I come bearing great news! After a week of endless, tiring, stressful searching…WE HAVE AN APARTMENT! It was truly fate that landed us this awesome apartment. As I mentioned earlier, we ran into this couple just by pure luck that wanted an out, and a few days later, their place is ours! Our top choice of a place to live was Manly, so we are thrilled to be living there and in a great location that is beautifully furnished. I think Tommy is most excited about the 45” flat screen TV…typical boy. I am sure you all want to hear the details of the new humble abode, but I am going to leave you hanging with curiosity until we officially move in.
The food festival was great, tents set up along the perimeter of the park lawn, and tables all throughout to sit an enjoy a great meal while listening to the DJ spin his jams. Of course we are in Australia so beer was flowing from the Coopers tent. The International Food Festival should actually have been called the Asian Invasion Food Festival because the only food in the 50 or so booths was Asian influenced. We ended up getting a mix of the Asian cuisine, dumplings from China, sushi from Japan and chicken pad Thai from Thailand. I am still trying to figure out where the rest of the food styles were as it was called the INTERNATIONAL food festival…
With nothing left on the agenda to do, we wandered around Manly on an hour and a half long walk before sliding into a booth in 4 Pines Brewery. We had a good lunch washed down with some delicious Manly brewed beer. We were lucky to find a movie theatre next store to the brewery that has $10 Tuesday specials for movies…MOVIE DATES ARE BACK ON! Tommy and I used to go on a movie date every weekend at Bucknell and we were missing this tradition of ours especially with movie tickets being $17 per person in Australia, so the Tuesday special was a great find! I guess I can't avoid admitting that a Max Brenners hot cocoa warmed us up on the ferry back to Circular Quay. If you haven't figured it out already, Tommy and I are a bit infatuated with Max Brenners.
The destination for today was the Featherdale Wildlife Park. Of course this is a very easy place to get to on a 40 minute train straight to the park, but of course we were determined to use our week passes which did not include a train out that far, so our trip was closer to two and a half hours! The riverboat ferry took us to the very last ferry stop, Parramatta, from there we walked to the train station and caught the train one town over to Blacktown, and then hopped on a bus to the front of the park. Well, we increased our journey time by riding right past the front gate, oblivious to where we were, and had to take the bus to its last stop before turning around and heading back to the Featherdale Wildlife Park. We tend to ride and walk in circles at least once a day... 
Featherdale is a great way to see the wildlife of Australia, but is better than a typical zoo because there is the option to pet and feed the kangaroos and koalas! We spent a few hours walking around and looking at the wombats, dingos, peacocks, kangaroos, koalas, fruit bats, snakes, and much much more, and truly were in animal heaven! How could we not be obsessed with the cute koalas sleeping up in the trees or the kangaroos that hop right up to you to say "hello mate!" The best part was that we got into the park for $6 off by purchasing a student ticket (Tommy's clever idea) after showing them our Bucknell Student ID cards, who knew those would come in handy in Australia! 'Ray Bucknell!
I must mention for my dear sister Molly that I have great news for you…Lulu is in Sydney! No, not KC Lulubell, but lululemon, right on George St. I know you are so excited to come visit me now!
We are here! AUSTRALIA! We woke up nice and early to watch the entire sail in to where we docked at Circular Quay. Although very grey, rainy and cold, it was still beautiful. We were so excited to be in Sydney that a little rain could not damper our joyous moods. As we walked down the gangplank, Tommy and I held hands and took our first step onto Australian land together with a bit of a squeal from me and whoop from Tommy. The couples around us laughed at our excitement. The sun broke through warming it up a bit, and we went in search of our hotel that we are moving into tomorrow for the next two weeks. For some reason we were convinced our hotel was on Kent street, a few blocks down from where it was actually located, so we ended up winding up and down the streets in between Circular Quay and Darling Harbor. Getting lost was a good way to explore the city! Our hotel is in an AWESOME location, just a block away from George Street (a very popular street in Sydney), and half a block from Max Brenners. It is very important that we are close to Max Brenners because it is the most phenomenal chocolate bar in the world, and I do not doubt that many trips will be made there for chocolate treats and yummy drinks. 
(Picture above: Tommy at Manly Beach)
(On the ferry to Manly)
(Manly Wharf)
Aboriginal Man Playing the Didgeridoo
10/4/11 – Sydney, Australia
Our new Aussie life starts today!!! We disembarked with our trolley full of luggage, and arrived at the Menzies Hotel, our new home for the next 13 days. After putting together a list of things to do, we headed out, and made it only 5 minutes before ducking into the McDonald’s to use their free WI-FI. When in Australia, go to McDonalds? We tried to get the majority of our errands started today, but ended up giving in the lure of the city and set off exploring. We enjoyed a nice afternoon snack and two Aussie beers at a great spot right under the Sydney Opera House with the best view of the bridge and our ship. As the sun set behind the bridge, the deep horn of the Volendam signified the end of one chapter of our journey, and the beginning of our new one in Sydney. 
(Ooops... we aren't staying here are we?)
(Ahh... this is our hotel!)
10/5/11 – Sydney, Australia
Today has been great, but unsuccessful of getting our “to-do” list done. We originally planned to grab some breakfast and take a nice walk around the Botanical Gardens Park before starting our day. Well 5 and a half hours later we are finally back to the hotel from our walk… We ended up grabbing a great breakfast under the Wynyard Station before heading through Circular Quay to the park. The park walk was gorgeous along the harbor coastline, taking us an hour to get up to Hyde Park. We found a park bench to sit on and enjoy the atmosphere with a great guitar player strumming by the fountain. We walked to the end of the rectangular Hyde Park, and found a war memorial exhibition to walk through called the ANZAC Memorial. On our way back towards our hotel, we zigzagged up the different streets to get a taste of the different areas, and found ourselves in the middle of Chinatown, pretty easily distinguishable when we realized we could not read the names of the different stores anymore as it was all Chinese symbols and we were the only white people on the crowded streets. We cut over to George St., which ran us into the Victoria Building. The Queen Victoria Building is a great indoor 4-story building with shops and food, with a ceiling made out of glass to let the sunshine through making it feel like you are in an outdoor mall. We found a great place to grab a delicious pizza for lunch before going back to the hotel. On our way back to the hotel we passed by an Apple Store, and thought we would just go in for a few minutes to check our email on their demo computers, and ended up spending an hour there! I think you know you are desperate when you use the Apple Stores computers to get your emails, Facebook and apartment hunting taken care of… I used to always make fun of the people I would see in Apple Stores using the computers for their personal business, and here I was on the other side, one of those people! 
(Hyde Park) (Anzac Memorial)
10/6/11 – Sydney, Australia
10/6/11 – Sydney, Australia
After hitting up some brekkie at the same spot, we already are considering ourselves regulars here (haha), we headed back to the McDonalds to take advantage of their testy but free Wi-Fi. How much more desperate can we get! We were met with A LOT of frustration when we were continuously logged out every 5 minutes, so we decided to come up with a better option. One of my contacts over here had just emailed me mentioning a public library, so we located the State Library of New South Wales on our map us tourists carry around with us, and headed to the library only 6 blocks up from our hotel, bordering the Royal Botanical Gardens. As much as we want to be exploring Sydney, we realize it is more important to find an apartment first so that we do not arrive back from our cruise and realize that we are homeless and must find a nice street bench to live on. So, we spent 5 long hours in the library before our brains just about exploded and our eyes watered from staring at a screen for too darn long. Unfortunately, after 30+ inquiries were sent out, the only responses we received were that the apartments were already leased. Just our luck... Finding an apartment is a bit harder than we expected, especially with summer rolling around the corner, and people moving to the beaches for the summer months, the beaches that we are trying to find an apartment in! Wish us better luck for tomorrow. 10/7/11 – Sydney, Australia
Another research day began this morning, but of course following our REGULAR brekkie routine. Living in Sydney is extremely expensive, and food prices are incredibly high. This is mainly because Australia’s minimum wage is a little over $15/hour, but since we are not currently bringing in any Australian money, this flat out sucks for us! So as a result, we have become experts at scouting prices, and finding the best deals around the city. This is why we have become breakfast regulars at our two breakfast spots, because of the great deals we have scored. We have breakfast every morning under the Wynyard subway station in a food court type setting; I order my $5.90 breakfast smoothie, and Tommy orders his $7.80 breakfast sandwich/Cappuccino combo. Although one of the cheapest breakfasts found in Sydney, I think they are both quite delicious!
Today we were focused on at least one of us setting up an Australian phone. After finding out that it was required to have an Australian bank account set up prior to activating a phone, we got some information and thought about our different options before spending another few hours researching apartments online. When we finally felt we were deserving of a break, we walked to The Rocks for their Friday food market. A small line of venders set up like a Farmer’s Market were lined up two blocks with delicious foods: ice cream, nuts, oils and vinegars, cupcakes, wraps, sushi, sausages, etc. We split a great rosemary and lamb sausage roll with caramelized onions, but of course only after trying some cookies and cream cupcakes. Dessert comes first right? Delicious to say the least! Tommy was already planning our future trips back, pointing out the bread, fruit and egg prices, and his idea to come every Friday to do our grocery shopping once we were living in an apartment, very cute.
After an hour in the bank, and an hour and a half in Vodafone, both closing while we were the last customers inside, Tommy had his bank account and phone set up, putting us one step closer to finding an apartment, and transforming us from tourists into locals! As a celebration, we headed to Bovarian Bier Cafe, a German restaurant that is currently celebrating Oktoberfest. When we first got off the ship in Sydney, Tommy immediately saw a sign on the back of one of the public buses advertizing Bovarian Bier Cafe, and of course decided we HAD to go there! You think Tommy likes beer? Well I have to say I am thrilled that he had his “beer goggles” on because the restaurant turned out to be awesome. The capital for Oktoberfest is Bovaria, and we lucked out with having a waitress who was from Bovaria! She helped us order the best German food and beers, allowing us to have a very delicious experience in this fun bar! With our huge beer glasses in hand we raised them to a great night with the men in their lederhosen pounding out German notes on their instruments behind us. It was a loud, fun and exciting environment, marking a great end to a busy day! 10/8/11 – Sydney, Australia
We soon found out that Australians like to take advantage of a late snooze on the weekend as we found ourselves walking through the ghost town of Sydney. Not only do the people sleep half the day away, but our breakfast spot does not even open!!! Luckily before our grumbling tummies got angrier, we found a good alternative a few doors down…fewf!
Because we had been striking out searching for an apartment online, and after making multiple calls this morning, we decided the best option might be going to the actual locations. After buying our week pass for the ferries, buses and trains, we hopped on the ferry to Manly. Walking down the streets in Manly, I saw a realtor sign out front of a place, and decided to go check it out. What a great way to start our search in Manly, stumbling into a $2,100,000 town house! Unfortunately we decided this was a bit above our price range, and we weren’t willing to pay the extra thousand or so… As we rushed to make it on time to one of the showings we had found online, a couple from the UK walked out letting us know that the realtor was no longer showing the apartment. Tommy inquired if the place had been furnished, and when they replied that no it was not furnished, he was relieved saying, “oh perfect, we need a place that is furnished anyways.” Well I could not help but notice the couple’s eyes lit up at the mention of needing a furnished apartment, and knew fate was in the works. It just so happened they had 3 months left on their fully furnished apartment in Manly and wanted to get out of it to move to a bigger, ocean-view spot. Fate? After a week of hardcore apartment hunting, this was finally a step in the right direction! We still went to the other apartment we had set up a viewing for, and after holding our breath for the two minutes we had to be trapped in that grotesque place, we ran out and did not look back!
We returned to the city satisfied, and headed straight to The Rocks for the food/flea market that is held every Saturday and Sunday. As we wandered through the different vendors, I could not help but follow the whooping cheers echoing off the walls. The sounds led me to a packed Irish bar, beer flowing left and right at 3pm in the afternoon, full of people watching the Ireland vs. Wales rugby game. How could we resist grabbing a beer and joining in on the excitement! Unfortunately Ireland lost, but we left before that occurred, probably a smart idea. The next game, England vs. Scotland, we watched in a bar called 333 just a block down from our hotel, and once again the team we were cheering for (England) lost. So I am now thinking that Tommy and I should not cheer for Australia tomorrow because maybe we are bad luck… NAH! AUSSIE AUSSIE AUSSIE, OY OY OY! 10/9/11 – Sydney, Australia
Calories were flying high this morning after dining at Pancakes on the Rocks. The Banana Rama (a stack of buttermilk pancakes topped with cream, a scoop of vanilla ice cream, caramelized bananas, and drizzled with homemade butterscotch) and Choco Supreme Surprise (a stack of buttermilk pancakes smothered in cream, ice cream, chocolate sauce, bananas, and walnuts) settled nicely into our tummies. We made use of our week long transportation passes, hopping on the bus from Circular Quay to Coogee. We lucked out with a gorgeous day, and after visiting a few rental agencies, we began the four-mile costal walk from Coogee to Bondi. I know I have been using a lot of Australian place names to describe our experiences, so I hope you are all pulling out a map as you read my blogs, but if not, Coogee and Bondi are both beach towns, connected by a gorgeous boardwalk that twists and turns around the coast, harboring two other beaches, Bronte and Tamarama, between the two. It took us just under an hour and a half to walk the two switching between power walking, strolling and pausing to take pictures. Coogee is about a third the size of Bondi, making it a great family spot, but Bondi is a better spot for young people to live. Tons of bars, cafes and shops line the streets, and a great Sunday flea market took over a few blocks. We would have loved to stay in Bondi all day, but we wanted to get back to the city for the Australia vs. South Africa rugby game. We arrived at a fun bar just in time for the start of the game, and 4 beers and many cheers later, Australia deserved their great victory over the Springboks! I guess we are not bad luck after all! The New Zealand vs. Argentina game followed the Australian victory, and we spotted #9, a Samoan beast who plays for the All Blacks (New Zealand). The reason we were looking out for him was actually because we just happened to meet his 7 year old son in Apia, Samoa swimming in the ocean with us. Pretty cool!
(Coogee Beach) (Bondi Beach)
(Tamarama Beach)
(Bronte Beach)
10/10/11 – Sydney, Australia
I come bearing great news! After a week of endless, tiring, stressful searching…WE HAVE AN APARTMENT! It was truly fate that landed us this awesome apartment. As I mentioned earlier, we ran into this couple just by pure luck that wanted an out, and a few days later, their place is ours! Our top choice of a place to live was Manly, so we are thrilled to be living there and in a great location that is beautifully furnished. I think Tommy is most excited about the 45” flat screen TV…typical boy. I am sure you all want to hear the details of the new humble abode, but I am going to leave you hanging with curiosity until we officially move in.After successfully setting up a bank account and Australian cell phone for me, it was time to have a fun day! We took a bus out to Surry Hills, a hip, young area with boutiques and cafes lining the streets, and a few promenades and parks scattered throughout. We walked from Surry Hills all the way back from our hotel, passing by Hyde Park which reminded us of the International Food Festival taking place there tonight.
The food festival was great, tents set up along the perimeter of the park lawn, and tables all throughout to sit an enjoy a great meal while listening to the DJ spin his jams. Of course we are in Australia so beer was flowing from the Coopers tent. The International Food Festival should actually have been called the Asian Invasion Food Festival because the only food in the 50 or so booths was Asian influenced. We ended up getting a mix of the Asian cuisine, dumplings from China, sushi from Japan and chicken pad Thai from Thailand. I am still trying to figure out where the rest of the food styles were as it was called the INTERNATIONAL food festival… A great walk across the bridge over to Darling Harbor helped walk off our food and beers. Darling Harbor is the next harbor over from Circular Quay. It reminds me a bit of the shopping and restaurant promenade at Disneyland, but as a horseshoe boardwalk surrounding a harbor. At night it was absolutely beautiful with the restaurant lights reflecting off the still dark ocean water. As we sat with our feet dangling over the bay, it was almost eerie with the stillness, I was ready for a shark fin to tear through the calm surface to disrupt the tranquility…luckily this was just one of my many daydreams that Tommy snapped me out of. I always say I was born with DDD also known as Day Dreaming Disorder, not such a bad “disorder” to have as it keeps my mind constantly entertained, but I am constantly caught staring off into space in my own world. Anyways, no shark to ruin our great evening, and we continued to walk around the entire harbor before passing back over the bridge to our hotel. When Tommy and I were talking about Darling Harbor on our walk back we used the word electrified to describe the harbor and its atmosphere. Of course we had not forgotten our plan to celebrate our apartment success over a Max Brenners treat, so we stopped in for a chocolate soufflé and half white half milk hot chocolate. Death by chocolate…talk about SWEET DREAMS!
10/11/11 – Sydney, Australia
Back to Manly we headed this morning to turn in our apartment rental application making us one step closer to making it official. Only the fun part left now...paying.
With nothing left on the agenda to do, we wandered around Manly on an hour and a half long walk before sliding into a booth in 4 Pines Brewery. We had a good lunch washed down with some delicious Manly brewed beer. We were lucky to find a movie theatre next store to the brewery that has $10 Tuesday specials for movies…MOVIE DATES ARE BACK ON! Tommy and I used to go on a movie date every weekend at Bucknell and we were missing this tradition of ours especially with movie tickets being $17 per person in Australia, so the Tuesday special was a great find! I guess I can't avoid admitting that a Max Brenners hot cocoa warmed us up on the ferry back to Circular Quay. If you haven't figured it out already, Tommy and I are a bit infatuated with Max Brenners.Our next adventure was decided and we headed over to Watson Bay where the delicious seafood restaurant, Doyles, awaited the arrival of our growling stomachs. We did not know that the ferry stopped running to Watsons Bay at 3pm, but we had a quick easy solution by hopping on a ferry to Rose Bay and then catching a bus from there to Watsons Bay. We are quite a resourceful couple.
The bus dropped us at its last stop, which was the very tip of Watsons Bay. This is where the harbor opens up into the ocean, between Watson Bay and Manly. There was a great walkway up to the tip of the bluff that gave a spectacular view of the vast ocean, but an even better view of the Sydney city line with the Harbor Bridge lit up from the sun. We watched our first Sydney sunset tonight while having our seafood meal at the famous Doyles Restaurant. Although the view was unbeatable, we were not thrilled with the food for what it cost...but this might be due to the fact that we picked the least expensive dishes on the menu! My night ended on a very happy note when Tommy surprised me and treated me to a dinner date! Such a romantic!
10/12/11 – Sydney, Australia
Taking advantage of our week long transportation passes, we decided to choose a destination that required a ferry, bus or train. Well, we ended up making use of all three of these forms of travel. We decided to go walk around Sydney Olympic Park. The ferry actually stopped 6 times along the way making it a long trip out. The thing I love about the ferry is that you get to see much more of Sydney traveling this way and it is beautiful on the water. We went under the Harbor Bridge for our first time, which was a pretty exciting experience.
Sydney Olympic Park is absolutely huge and has really neat modern architecture. It was not that exciting being there with no competitions going on, but it was still fun to walk around. We found a little hole in the wall restaurant serving phenomenal kebab wraps for lunch before taking the train back to our hotel.
Tonight we enjoyed dinner at a very hip spot, the Ivy. This is in two huge buildings encompassing many levels with different style restaurants, and a pool lounge with cabanas and bars. With the DJ spinning and Tommy gnawing down on his ribs, I had the best view in the house.
10/13/11 - Sydney, Australia
The destination for today was the Featherdale Wildlife Park. Of course this is a very easy place to get to on a 40 minute train straight to the park, but of course we were determined to use our week passes which did not include a train out that far, so our trip was closer to two and a half hours! The riverboat ferry took us to the very last ferry stop, Parramatta, from there we walked to the train station and caught the train one town over to Blacktown, and then hopped on a bus to the front of the park. Well, we increased our journey time by riding right past the front gate, oblivious to where we were, and had to take the bus to its last stop before turning around and heading back to the Featherdale Wildlife Park. We tend to ride and walk in circles at least once a day... 
Featherdale is a great way to see the wildlife of Australia, but is better than a typical zoo because there is the option to pet and feed the kangaroos and koalas! We spent a few hours walking around and looking at the wombats, dingos, peacocks, kangaroos, koalas, fruit bats, snakes, and much much more, and truly were in animal heaven! How could we not be obsessed with the cute koalas sleeping up in the trees or the kangaroos that hop right up to you to say "hello mate!" The best part was that we got into the park for $6 off by purchasing a student ticket (Tommy's clever idea) after showing them our Bucknell Student ID cards, who knew those would come in handy in Australia! 'Ray Bucknell!10/14/11 – Sydney, Australia
The last step is DONE! Making great use out of the LAST day of our transportation pass, we took the ferry over to Manly and signed the lease for our apartment! Now it is actually 100% official. That being said, we have two bunk beds in our new place so all of you who have been jealous reading the blog can come on over and stay with us, you don’t have an excuse not to anymore! If you’re lucky, I may even cook you some breakfast in the morning, making it kind of like Tommy and Kaitlin’s Bed and Breakfast…not too shabby.
We had a great lunch in a little hole-in-the-wall quaint café called Hemmingway’s. Old, musty books line the bookshelf walls, and an old Hendricks bottle is used to serve the water.
I must mention for my dear sister Molly that I have great news for you…Lulu is in Sydney! No, not KC Lulubell, but lululemon, right on George St. I know you are so excited to come visit me now! We had a really excellent and unique dinner at a restaurant on The Rocks called Wine Odyssey. We both ordered the red wine flight that came with three different wines paired with three courses of food. This included a wine from Margaret River, Western Australia, paired with beef carpaccio, a wine from Southern Australia, paired with roasted saltwater barramundi, and a wine from New South Wales, paired with seared kangaroo. Nope that is not a typo…yesterday we were petting and feeding kangaroos, today we ate one-- sorry ‘bout it!
After dinner we thought we would check out a fun bar just around the corner called Argyle. Argyle was a really hip, happening bar, and looked like a great place to be on a Friday night, until we realized we do not have any friends or money…shoot. So after sharing a beer (lame), we realized that we had no more money to drink and it was getting awkward with people watching without really being a part of the crowd, so we headed back to the hotel to avoid being kicked out by the bouncers for stalking people. What better way could there be to cheer us up then a Max Brenner chocolate drizzled sugar waffle? We had no choice but to stop for a sweet treat on our way back to the hotel…
10/15/11 – Sydney, Australia
Six hours later, our legs were wobbling, barely making it down the hallway to our room. That is six hours of walking around the city, with only a short break for lunch. There are outdoor markets every weekend in Sydney in almost every different city area--Coogee, Bondi, Surry Hills, Paddington, The Rocks, Manly, and more. These are similar to a Farmer's Market; however, rather than solely selling food, clothing, art and jewelry are also being sold. The Paddington market was ranked number one of 2010, and is open every Saturday. We decided that we must go browse the many stalls of the famous Paddington Market on Oxford St. After walking a few miles and strolling through the many stalls, we headed to Paddy’s Market. This is actually in a completely different area in the center of China Town. Paddy’s Market is very similar to the markets one would find down the back alleys in Shanghai, cheap, discounted souvenirs, clothing, etc. (even golf clubs!) being sold in many jam packed booths. Paddy’s Market is open almost everyday of the week, and is constantly packed with people looking for some great bargain deals. Our next stop was over and down quite a few blocks to the Sydney Fish Market. This was our favorite stop on our long walking tour. After walking for hours on a pretty empty stomach following a breakfast of coffee and a split chocolate croissant, we were absolutely starving by the time we arrived at the Fish Market at 2pm. The Sydney Fish Market is open daily to the public from 10am – 5pm, selling all the fresh seafood catches of the morning, and preparing it right on the spot to eat. Of course you could buy some fresh fish, lobster, oysters, and much more and take it home, but we had them make it fresh for us right in the market to have some lunch in the harbor. The harbor was just one down from Darling Harbor, not too far of a walk back to our hotel. Not only were the lobster, shrimp, oysters, and sashimi extremely fresh and delicious, but they were also damn cheap! Our kind of a spot.
Tonight we went to a underground club called the Basement for a concert. To secure our spots, we had to arrive two hours early, and got a bit bored sitting around, but it was worth it once the first band came on. Because alcohol was so expensive, Tommy snuck out to a liquor store around the corner, bought a flask of whisky, and snuck it back in to spike our cokes that we ordered! That is the way we roll… The concert was pretty good, but we actually enjoyed the opening act more than the main group!
10/16/11 – Sydney, Australia
Happy Birthday Daddy from Australia!!!
On Sunday mornings, the hotel delivers a free Sunday paper to every room. As I was reading through the paper this morning, I stumbled across an announcement for the Sydney Opera House free tour! Well we were not going to miss this opportunity since we had been planning to pay for a backstage tour as it was, so we got up and headed straight over from our hotel. Of course by the time we got there, a huge line had already formed, and we were told that it would be about a 2-hour wait from where we were in the line. There was no way I was about to stand in line for 2 hours, so I told Tommy I would be right back, and a few minutes later I gave him a call letting him know I was in the Opera House and to hurry his booty up to come meet me. Twenty-five minutes later, cutting past 500+ people, we started our hour-long tour of all the different theatres, dressing rooms, and the backstage of the Opera House. I am a good person to have around in a time crunch.
We leave for our cruise around New Zealand tomorrow, and could not be more excited, but that means today we have to pack up, do some laundry, and scout out where the port is we will be leaving from. We are meeting up with Gina, a potential Aussie friend (wooo finally), at the Opera Bar for a drink before heading over to a sports bar to watch the semi-final Australia vs. New Zealand rugby game! GO AUSTRALIA!
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