The Land of OZ

As most of you know, Kevin and I were down in Sydney last week and we had a blast! This was the 3rd time we were down there together so we had already seen alot of the "tourist" attractions, but we were able to find some new activities for this trip. Here's the layout:

After a 14 hour flight, we arrived in Sydney around 8:30am on Wednesday morning. We were able to check into the hotel around 10 and then we went out exploring the area. We stayed in a new hotel that was right near Darling Harbour and Chinatown so there was plenty to see and do. We had some great food and did some shopping and crashed around 5pm. We slept through most of the night and woke up bright and early on Thursday. 

A sign of all of the nearby attractions in the Darling Harbour area.

On Thursday we went to the Sydney Aquarium right in the middle of Darling Harbour. We have always wanted to go to the Aquarium, but the other (non-marine) wildlife interested us more. This time we decided to go to the Aquarium and it was so much fun! We were able to see not only one, but two, Dugongs! What is a Dugong you ask? A Dugong is a mammal that looks mostly like a manatee, but has the tail of a dolphin. They are mostly found in the northern waters of Australia and are near extinction. There are only 6 Dugongs held in captivity in the whole world, so it was quite the treat to see two of them! We also saw a huge saltwater crocodile, sharks, octopus, jellyfish, and many more - the platypus chose not to show his face
:(.

They say that dugongs are like mermaids.

About to go into the Sydney Aquarium

Just being goofy at the entrance.

Lunch time!

WOW! They were pretty cool creatures!

Just eating some dinner.

Real or plastic? Could have fooled me!

They had an awesome Great Barrier Reef exhibit.

The rest of Thursday we spent walking around the area some more. We ate more great food and did some more shopping. We even went back to the aquarium later in the evening to try to see the platypus, but still no luck. We fell asleep pretty early agian.

On Friday we went to Sydney's Wildlife World - we ended up getting a deal if we bought this ticket with the Aquarium ticket. We saw all kinds of creatures! We saw the world's most dangerous spider, the world's largest cockroach, the worlds most venomous snake, the worlds most dangerous bird, and of course some Koala's and Roos! It was another great day!

Just being goofy again.

Kevin got to hold a stickbug.

The world's most dangerous spider - The Sydney Funnel Web (only the males are lethal!)

The world's largest cockroach - Australian Giant Burrowing Cockroach

And the world's most venemous snake - the Inland Taipan.

On Saturday we went to the ship. There was not much work to be done so we were on and off the ship within 2 hours, and that was stretching it! We saw that there was some kind of outdoor concert going on at the Opera House, so we quickly took a ferry back to the hotel and then went back to the Opera House to see what was going on. When we got there they told us that they were setting up for the finale of Australian Idol to take place on Sunday night. Unfortunately the tickets were sold out, but we were able to watch it live on TV - more to come on that in a minute.  After we left the Opera House we went to the Rocks Market and then went out to Bondi Beach.

The view from the ferry.

The Australian Idol stage.

The view from the other side - right outside the Opera House

On Sunday we went down to an area called La Perouse, just south of Sydney. This was a new adventure for us and we had a difficult time getting there because the buses were not running a normal shedule on the weekend. It took us about 2 hours and many road blocks, but we finally made it down there around 1pm. We went there with the intention of seeing an Aboriginal named Laddie Timbry, who did some boomerang throwing instruction, but ended up having a slightly different experience. Laddie left early in the day because it was so hot (close to 100 F), but there was another Aboriginal man there named Vic Simms. I was able to catch him right before he left and buy a beautiful, hand-crafted, boomerang. Come to find out, Vic Simms is like the Johnny Cash of Australia. He was sent to prison for robbery and while there was contacted by RCA records to record 10 songs. He recorded 10 songs in an hour and created a classic album called The Loner. He then toured around other prisons in the Australia area, and was one of the first people to ever perform in the Sydney Opera House. It was an awesome experience!

This boomerang is beautiful and huge! I can't wait to try and throw it!

When we got back into the city we did some last minute shopping and then went back to the room for the rest of the night. We were able to watch Australian Idol live and it was so cool to see the show, since we saw them setting up for it the day before. It was pretty spectacular! Here is a clip from the show - Michael Buble singing Cry Me a River, with an unbelievable fireworks spectacular in the background! I wish we had thought to go watch the fireworks live, but this is second best.

A photo of the fireworks over the Opera House.

We flew home on Monday and are so glad to be back, and finally with ALL of our luggage (my bag got lost in translation, when Kevin recieved both of his bags, and finally arrived 36 hours later). Sorry for the lengthy post! I hope you enjoyed it!