Sydney - What a Great City!

* pictures are noted bottom to top

After a short flight from Hobart to Sydney, we took a taxi to our apartment in Greenwich, an upscale, picturesque North Sydney harbor suburb about 12 minutes by ferry away from the heart of the downtown city. After settling into our new 'home' - a 1 bedroom, 1 bath studio with wrap around deck and sliding doors that open to the beautiful harbor view below (picture 1 & 2). we familiarized ourselves with the neighborhood. After walking around a bit, we did our favorite activity of finding the nearby market where Wonderful gourmet delights were plentiful. We stocked up for a few homemade meals, got some wine next door at the liquor store and walked the 10 minutes back to the apartment in a light rain. Once at the front door we turned around and saw the end of a beautiful rainbow over the city sky scape (picture 3).

Our first priority the next day was to submit our urgent (24 hour turnaround) applications for Vietnam visas. Luckily for us there was a travel office in Marrickville, the Vietnam section of the city. So, being good commuters we took the convenient ferry, only a 7 minute walk on a nature trail, (picture 4 of Greenwich ferry landing) and then planned to take the connecting train to Marrickville. Once on the ferry however, we struck up a conversation with a new fun friend, Lisa and her son Finn, who lived in Marrickville and were kind enough to not only drive us to the travel agency, but also stay with us all day. We had a delicious lunch, visited Lisa's lovely home and then was hosted to a informative drive through all the different neighborhoods of this beautiful city including the famous opera house, Parliament, botanical gardens, etc. (picture 5)

By the second day, we were becoming excellent navigators of the city's wonderful transportation system including ferries, buses, and trains. We went back to Marrickville, unfortunately without Lisa, to pick up our visas and passports after we visited the main section of downtown central - George St- for some shopping at Queen Victoria Galleria (picture 6).

The following day, since the weather was again cool but beautifully clear and sunny, we took the ferry to Watson Bay where we walked along the entrance to Sydney Harbor, Gap Bluff (picture 7). We then had a wonderful lunch of fish and chips and seafood chowder at the famous Doyle's Restaurant (picture 8). Once back at the city, we walked through the crowds at the historic and popular area called The Rocks (picture 9).

We were able to catch up on some computer work during the rest of the week and still have time to take the connecting ferries to Darling Harbor (picture 10) where we dined, saw a Darwin exhibition at the National Maritime Museum (picture 11) and even took in an Imax 3-D movie 'Under the Sea". Very touristy, but still a lot of fun.

As always happens, the week came to an end too soon and before we knew it we were preparing for the next chapter of our travels to Southeast Asia. To lighten our load we sent a package of clothes home and also our heavier, winter-type clothes on to South Africa where we will need it most since it will be winter when we get there in another month. On our way out, we enjoyed the last view of this beautiful city as we headed out to the airport by ferry and train (picture 12).