Okay, so I did a really bad job of doing regular posts. A long day of walking really takes the energy out of you. And so I've been keeping little tabs of the things we've been doing via my iPhone notes app. With these notes I will try and compile our memories of our Sydney trip! (And also the first couple days in Perth since we're here now... But more on that later!)
This is going to be a long ass post.
February 7
I had been waiting two days for my luggage. Called them using our housemate's cellphone and as it turns out they were unable to call me so they never sent it out. Had to wait at home for them to deliver it, as they needed a signature. It was the morning and they said it would arrive between 12-4pm. So we waited. It arrived at roughly 2pm... Hallelujah. Later that day we met with our fellow Canadian, Sarah Lin, a friend from our high school as well as a classmate of mine in some criminology classes over at SFU. She's currently on a working visa in Australia for a year and residing in Sydney so it was nice to cross paths before we headed off to Perth. It was definitely nice to see a familiar face! We met at Central and walked over to Darling Harbour to hang around and stroll down the harbour. Originally, we wanted to see the fireworks that happen every Saturday night but we ended up missing them as they only run for about fifteen minutes. Instead, we ended up getting some ice cream and people watching. People get really dolled up for the harbour! The women were all wearing sky high heels and party dresses. There are a ton of night clubs and really nice restaurants and lounges not to mention on the opposite side there are loads of docked yachts and boats. This is how the other side lives. So fancy. Actually reminded us a bit of Vancouver really. Ended up walking all the way down back to Circular Quay where we parted ways and we took the train back to our place in Greenwich arriving home just after midnight. Latest night out for us, needless to say we were a bit tired. (Why are we so old?!).
February 8
Being our first Airbnb experience, Alex and I didn't know what to expect. We had stayed in hotels and a hostel-esque place -- not so much a real hostel experience but a private room and shared living space -- but never someone's own place. The whole concept of someone opening up their homes, their personal space, to strangers around the world is so nerve racking. What if you hate these people? What if they're completely crazy? But there's always the chance that you could really hit it off as well. The owner of the place, Lincoln, is actually staying in Berlin, as he just had a child there. So instead, we met with the long-time tenants of the apartment, a lovely couple, Travis and Therese. And luckily for us, they were both super relaxed and friendly. On this day they invited us to accompany them to go to Narrabeen Beach, about a 45 minute drive from our place in Greenwich. Being brought around the city by a pair of locals? Um, yes please! We also only ever got around the city via public transit, which though extremely comprehensive, can be a hassle to get anywhere farther out. So off we headed in their car with a surf board, two body boards, a skim board, and a huge tub of 50+ SPF sunscreen. Narrabeen beach is a bit north of Manly beach. The area reminded Alex and I a bit like California actually sort of like Beverly Hills. Beachfront and gorgeous houses along the hills, it truly just felt like we were on the west coast just south of our beautiful home, Vancouver.
Later on we headed over to a little cafe on the beachfront and had lunch. Service was running on "beach time", really slow. We got burgers and freshly squeezed juices and shakes. Then we headed back home and I fell asleep lulled into slumber with the help of the extreme heat. And then we got home and napped for another few hours, still clad in our bathing suits because honestly it was way too hot for anything else.
Being so close to the hole in the ozone layer, the sun on this side of the world is very unforgiving. I used to be able to get away with not putting any sunscreen on and going out in the sun and not getting burned. I would always rely on my Filipino genes to get me by sans sunburn. And for the most part, it almost always worked! But this time it did not. I got a mild sunburn on my upper back/shoulder blade area and part of my chest. I don't even know what to do when you get a sunburn! Lesson learned: DO NOT go in the sun without sunscreen, even if it's overcast, put that shit on! Alex of course got burned, but was that even a question? Currently, he's in the process of moulting his burned skin off… he looks like he's gonna fly away with all the peeling skin flaps. Kidding. Sort of. (update: I'm spending moments peeling off large sheets of skin off Alex's back... haha, gross but weirdly satisfying...)
February 9
We booked a wine tour on this day and they were scheduled for pick up in the city at 7:15 am. The Hunter Valley is a few hours north of Sydney so it's quite the trek, hence the early pick up. And of course since we are Alex and Jordyn we are going to be running late. We ended up leaving the house at 6:45 and running to the train (well part running mostly trying to walk faster than my normal pace) and getting there just five minutes late. Luckily we just caught them before they were off! This wine tour consisted of 3 couples and we were the youngest by at least 30 years haha! It's all good though seeing as it is a wine tour... it should be all good fun once we all pound a few glasses back. One couple were Americans who retired in the Dominican Republic and the other was a couple from Austria who both happened to be pilots! Since it was super early and the drive up was so long we took a break after an hour to go to the Wildlife Park for tea or coffee and some snacks and also to visit with some animals! Such a great way to start off your day!! It was so perfect that they happened to sandwich this activity in before the winery tours began. I had this already on my bucket list of things to do while in Australia, so having this come as a freebie during a wine tour.. score! The zoo keepers came out with a baby crocodile and koala to pet. Then they gave us some feed and we went off into the fenced in area where the kangaroos, emus, and geese were allowed to roam free and hop around. It was so surreal, the kangaroos would either eat your feed or chomp on the grass, which makes them basically natural lawn mowers -- pretty cool.
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| Probably the alpha male, look at those muscles... |
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| My wallaby homies chillin. |
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| This was before he stole and ate my bag of feed. |
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| This was after. |
We then hopped back onto the bus to continue our journey into wine country. The first place we went to was my favourite place for sure. The winery representative sat us all down at a table with some cheese, crackers, and olives and explained every wine she poured for us. It was a lot nicer to have her select the best wines for us instead of having us take guesses at what to sample next. We learned that for women especially the tongue palate changes over time, which is a good reason why most young women enjoy very sweet, fruity drinks like coolers. It was also nice to know that they don't snob the younger clients for preferring white wines or more off-dry ('sweeter') tasting wines either. I left with a late harvest semillon for $15 AUD, not a bad price for quality wine! If we were staying in Sydney later I might've gotten more!
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View from our first winery! |
The next few wineries were literally "what would you like to try?" *pour* type places. But still very friendly staff, no prepared lists of wine samples though. So you had to rely more on the descriptions on each wine. But of course, since it's a wine tour you can go ahead and sample to your heart's content. So naturally, we tried a shit ton. Classy early twenty-somethings sampling every wine they can.
After the second winery we took a break for lunch at a lovely restaurant with it's own cellar door winery attached. Our lunch consisted of calamari, caesar salad, spaghetti bolognese, antipasto plate, and sticky date pudding. Each of us also had one white and one red wine as well. We ended with a dessert wine called Muscat, which had a bit of brandy in it making it a bit sweeter. It was a bit too much like cough medication for me to enjoy it. Then we headed to the winery attached to the restaurant for more sampling! It was more or less a lot of the same. This winery however would try to read you as a wine drinker and would recommend for you to try certain wines depending on your preferences and the wines you enjoyed sampling, which I thought was pretty cool. They tailored it right down to the most perfect wine... so of course I bought it. By this time I was fairly buzzed and had a good drunk vibe going. It was a good thing that it was our last winery and we were headed home. I napped on the bus the rest of the way back and we arrived back in the city at 5:30.
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| Safety first. |
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| Sticky date. |
February 10
This was a rather chill and relaxed day for me and Alex. We just walked over to a local beach in the suburb we are staying in called Greenwich Baths. You have to pay $3 to get in though, which is kind of a rip off considering you can go to any other large beaches for free but I guess you pay for the squared off space and smaller number of people. And if you're not wanting to travel super far then paying the small fee would be better than paying over that amount in gas or train tickets. We hang out there, Alex swam and listened to music, and I read on my Kindle.
After we finished soaking up some rays we walked over to Hooked, a local seafood restaurant that also sold seafood by the pound. I tried the barramundi and salad and alex had coconut shrimp and fries. It was pretty good and the prices weren't awful! So we chalked it up to a local win!
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| Barramundi |
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| Coconut shrimp |
We ended the day picking up our housemate Therese with her husband, Travis. She was working out in Manly that day and both Alex and I hadn't been yet so Travis said to join him, as he was planning on convincing Therese to go for a swim at the beach with him. Once there we enjoyed the evening views of Manly beach filled with pinky purple skies and deep blue green waters. It was so gorgeous and so different from how Manly looks during the day we soon learned the following day. Later that night our housemates were lovely enough to offer dinner to us, so we shared some stir fry and good conversation with some breaks to zap the annoying mozzies (aussie for mosquitoes). We also shared some wine that we bought for them. I'm so glad we got to know them during our stay in Sydney, it was such a fine first impression for our first stay at an Airbnb!
February 11
We decided to hit up Manly beach once again with our friend from Canada, Sarah, who is living and working in Australia for a year. Luckily for all of us the annual Australian Open was taking place on Manly Beach February 7th to the 14th... truly in the right place at the right time! We met up with Sarah and her friend and enjoyed the magnificent waves and water that Manly beach had to offer as well as that sweltering hot sun. We came prepared with a ton of sunscreen this time... we learned our lesson already. There was so much going on along the beach that Alex and I took a walk along the beach to see everything that was happening. There was a skateboarding competition going on in addition to the surfing competition, a handful of food trucks, booths, pop-up stores selling Australian Open paraphernalia, and many people.
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| Ended my time at Manly with a waffle and ice cream... as you do. |
February 12
To start our morning Alex and I went to a local cafe and switched our orders from the last time we were there. I had the big breakfast consisting of fried eggs, bacon, sausage, mushrooms, toast, and a tomato (the most heavenly combination, I swear) and Alex had the avocado and tomato on Turkish bread (also amazing in its own respect).
Once we were fuelled up and ready to go we headed over to Circular Quay to catch the ferry to Taronga Zoo! It was so, so, so amazing!! It was so much better than any other zoo I've been to. It was much more open and less caged off, so you felt like it was a really intimate experience viewing the animals. Most animals were just distanced a ways away from where the people watched behind the borders. I'll just post some pictures to give an idea of the animals we saw.
The zoo closed at 5pm but we ended up staying a half hour later and we never even got kicked out. It was so quiet and tranquil without all the other people around and we really got to see the animals without having to deal with the crowds of people. There was an Australian walkabout that you actually walked through containing little wallabies and emus. There were no barricades between us so we actually got to interact with one of the little wallabies and pet it and feed it leaves! I am in love with wallabies, too! Especially this one, it was just the sweetest thing I'd ever seen! I wanted to take it home with me.
February 13
On our last day in Sydney we stayed home during the early morning to be responsible and tie up some loose ends with uni things. We then headed out for lunch at Hooked where Alex ordered a bacon and egg wrap (typical Alex haha) and I ordered the Hooked burger which was out of this world amazing. It was your basic burger consisting of patty, tomato, romaine lettuce, cheese, and ALSO bacon, an egg, and some beets! Amazing. So good. My god. Two of the most amazing burgers of my life I had in Australia, go figure!
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| NOM NOM NOM. |
We then made our way to Bondi beach, the second most popular beach in the world! We chose a weird day to go as it wasn't super sunny and was overcast but it still breathtaking nevertheless! It was a tiny little beach in comparison to Manly and there were fewer people since it wasn't as hot, which just meant that there was more beach for us! We didn't pack our bathing suits so we just walked around in the sand and dipped our feet in. It later started raining so slowly but surely people started packing up for the day. We refused to go home after only being here less than an hour so we stuck it out and waited a bit for the rain to stop and walked along the side toward Coogee beach. Spoiler alert: we never made it to Coogee. But we took some pretty cool shots of what we did see!
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Pano photos are my jam.    |
Once it got dark out we headed back to see Circular Quay one last time and bid farewell to the wonderful Sydney Opera House and the Sydney Harbour bridge! Also, we had never seen them at night and wanted to see how the view looked at night as well. We were both super hungry so we walked along the side of the harbour in search of a last-night-in-Sydney-dinner. Alex was in the mood for steak and I was in the mood for kangaroo (total tourist over here) so we agreed on this slightly posh restaurant with seating outside so we could enjoy our last night in Sydney. We were a bit underdressed -- Alex was wearing cargo shorts and a muscle tee -- but ah well.
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| Kangaroo fillets |
February 14
Our last day! So bittersweet. Also Valentine's Day but we paid no attention. Running late as Jordyn and Alex tend to do we finished packing up later than expected. And we had plans on lugging a large checked bag each, a roller luggage, and a backpack (and skim board for Alex). Luckily for us, Travis offered us a ride to the nearest train station, which really saved us. Otherwise, we would have had to hustle our asses with three bags each to the train station which is roughly 20 minutes walking. Alex thought we were running super late for the flight, I thought we were okay. Once we arrived at the domestic airport terminal the Qantas lady assured us we had loads of time. Take that, Alex. And so we proceeded to check-in at the terminals and check our luggages. Both our carry-on luggages were a bit heavy so the representative wanted us to check them... for over $50 AUD... no thank you. I would make it work. So I moved some things around and she allowed me to go ahead. Alex, however, was too over it to even try. He just paid the extra fee. Once that was all sorted we headed over to the tiniest security check I had ever seen. It took us maybe two minutes to get through in total, a record! We then made our way to our gate and got ready to board our flight to Perth, our new home for he next half a year!
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| Most decent airplane food I ever had, thanks Qantas! |
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| And they served us ice cream for our snack. Yass. |
And that was Syndney! Now on to Perth! We've been here about four days or so and I will remember to keep posting more often... once we're all settled in. It's been a crazy roller coaster fun yet stressful time so far so more on that in another blog post. Until then, I will talk to you later!
