*No-No-Notorious
*Glimpses at the rear
What a great place to be-- the weather could not have been better and there was so much to do and see. If there was a tour, by God, we were on it. Observatories, walking, the Opera House, harbors, beaches, walking, towers, mass transit-- whew, what an adventure.
My favorite part was the Royal Botanical Gardens. What a stroke of genius to set this land aside! There are numerous walking trails, trees aplenty and unbeatable views of the harbor and Opera House.
*Mrs. Macquerie's Chair
*Royal Botanical Gardens
*Royal Botanical Gardens
We really packed a lot into a few short days. Luckily, public transport was fairly extensive and ran everywhere we wanted or needed to go (unlike Melbourne, they have double-decker trains...brilliant!). Mostly though, we let our feet do the walking. And what a lot of walking we did...
I had a day free while John was still in class. I hit the streets and visited the Art Gallery of New South Wales. The admission was free and I got to view some excellent Australian photography from the 1950's.
*Art Gallery of New South Wales
After my visit to the gallery, I went to the Sydney Tower, the southern hemisphere's tallest observation deck. Before I got there I ran across this giant chess board. As you can see there is quite a crowd, so I rested my dogs a moment and watched the match play out.
*Checkmate!
Right now you may be thinking, "hang on, haven't they already been to the southern hemisphere's tallest observation deck". If you are, your memory is very good. The Skydeck 88 (found in "Melbourne Tourists Unite") is the southern hemispheres tallest residential observation deck.
*From Sydney Tower (notice St. Mary's in the bottom right corner)
*Archibald Fountain and St. Mary's Cathedral
Another highlight was the tour of the Opera House. The architect, Jorn Utzon, has never even seen the completed building. There are some who say the Opera House is nothing to get excited about. I beg to differ, it's an engineering marvel! I've posted several photos for those of you who also may never get to see it. For your information, it's a working building with 5 performance halls. I'd have like to gone to see a show, but we just didn't have time to fit everything in. Next time, Opera House. Next. Time.
*JP in between the two main performance halls
*The outer shell...completely self-cleaning
*The ribs of the the shell
*Interior of the Opera House, outside one of the main performance halls
*Opera House and the harbor
*In between the Opera House and Central Quay (pronounced key)
We also took a harbor cruise, some may call it a ferry but I prefer cruise. What a beautiful harbor.
*Harbor Bridge and Luna Park (notice the two towers, also known as pylons)
We also hit another Australian beach, the famous Bondi Beach, though I have to admit I'd never heard of Bondi until we moved. Even though it was pretty chilly, many people were out riding the waves.
*Surf breaking at Bondi Beach
*Bondi Beach
One of the tours that we did not get to go on-- and believe me this was a cost issue-- was the Bridge Climb. You actually get to walk up the arch! Even John Black and Marlena Evans Black have been on the bridge climb-- they are on the celebrity climb wall...John took me into the reception room of the BridgeClimb office to torture me.
Instead we walked across the Harbor Bridge and went up into one of the four pylons, or towers that help anchor the bridge. In the second picture, you will notice small figures in the upper left hand corner. These are humans on the BridgeClimb tour. Next time, Harbor Bridge. Next. Time.
*At the base of the pylon
*Atop one of the 4 bridge pylons
I'm so glad that we got to experience Sydney on such a great week and don't think that just because we've been once we won't go again!
2 comments:
Sydney looks awesome! I am certain the two of you will find the opportunity to return and do the Bridge Climb. Your pictures and postings make all of us feel like we are there with you experiencing everything. The Opera House architect looks slightly different from the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville.
Your dad is 54 today and we are excited (not excited about getting older) because we are going to get away for a few days! No blackberry or cell phone just some long overdue R&R!
Take care and remember we love and miss you!
Mom
What's up cousins?? Alicia and I finally have got internet!(it took way longer than expected). As for the newlywed life, it's going great. We missed you at the wedding but one thing you didn't miss was the heat. It was about 99 degrees at the start of the ceremony and there was absolutely NO breeze. But Reverend Ray kept it short and sweet and it was over in like 15 minutes. Of course with all the Crafts there and a few good friends from college, we partied like rock stars at the reception and then continued the party over at the hotel hospitalilty room until about 3 a.m.! As for the honeymoon, St. Lucia was unbelievable. When and if y'all vacation again, I definitely reccommend all-inclusive. All we did was eat and drink all day, everyday(well, that's not all we did;) The resort had 3 big pools with swim up bars and 7 restuarants and the most beautiful ocean I have ever scene. No matter how far you swam out in the ocean you could see the bottom. We didn't do any excursions because every couple we talked to that did do them had horror stories about them so we played it safe an stayed on the resort and tried to drink our money's worth. We have been back in the real world for about 3 weeks now, trying to get organized and such. We only have about 4 weeks left of summer vacation left before school starts on August
4th. Actually for me, I only have about 2 weeks or so and then football gets back into full swing. We are planning on going to jana's for a cookout for the 4th of July tomorrow, Justin and Nikki will be there to so that ought to be fun.
I received that text about AC/DC and replied but I got a text back saying that the message was sent from Skype and I couldn't respond to it using my phone and at that time we didn't have internet. How is everything going down there? Syndey looks awesome! I sooo hope to visit y'all one day. Anyway, hope all is well and we miss you. Talk to soon, now that we have the internet and all. Take care!
Love ya!
Blake and Alicia
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