Downunder 1: Heading south
We left the old world on a Boeing 747 belonging to Malaysia Airlines. The trip to Kuala Lumpur took us across all kinds of nice places like Afghanistan, Kazakhstan and Iran. Lovely views of the Afghan mountain ranges at moonlight.
After 12 hours of backbreaking seating, four re-runs of The Incredibles and lots of strange airline food, we finally landed in Malaysia, only to have to wait for some hours in a deserted airport, waiting for the connecting flight to Sydney. Without any troubles we arrived there in the evening, after being thoroughly decontaminated.
Our Sydney hotel was located in the city centre, on Pitt street. This was a great location, as all the cool stuff was a short walking distance away.
Monday was a bit of a lost day. We walked around the city for a bit saw harbour bridges and strange opera places, but the skies were to gloomy for taking decent photo's. It was 21 degrees Celsius (probably Arctic by Aussie standards) and it drizzled a bit. We had a lot of fun looking at all the people; businesspeople with obligatory paper coffee-cup in hand; Asian kids with fully blinged-up import cars, and everyone in a car driving like he just killed someone.
On Tuesday we went to the Blue Mountains. We took the train there for a look of what Australian jungles consist of. Apparently of trees, rocks and Japanese tourists. Didn't see any wombats. Still not the best weather, but it did start to clear up in the afternoon.
Wednesday I had arranged to meet Roseability, but that morning I suddenly realised I didn't even know what he looks like in real life. The only thing I remembered was that he likes Indy music and has lots of hair. In the hotel lobby it became apparent this was enough for positive identification. We walked around the city and talked a lot about geek stuff. Nice to find
out these internet people actually exist for real.
Thursday was when the real pretty weather started. We took the ferry to Manly beach and looked around for a bit. It's great that when in Sydney, you can go everywhere by boat. It's
Very relaxing. (probably not when you're in a hurry, but we weren't.) Afterwards we walked around in some suburb, for a look of how the largest bit of Sydney looks like.
Friday I went on a fast harbour cruise with my brother, my dad had to take care of some conference things. Whilst burning our faces off in the sun, we wondered for a moment whatever
happened to the hole in the ozone layer, but decided to not think about it to much. We got off the ship in Watson's bay to take some more pictures. Watson's Bay is an out of
the way suburb at the tip of the Vaucluse Peninsula, known for astoundingly expensive water views. We saw 12 houses we wanted to buy, but couldn't afford any of them (also, we questioned
whether there would be broadband internet access available).
We lunched at a Dutch poffertjes shop, which can be recommended to anyone in the Darling Harbour area.
We spent most evenings dining in one of the many the great restaurants in Darling Harbour, enjoying the magnificent view.
Unfortunately, Saturday was our last day in Sydney. So we had to leave without seeing koala's or outback. On the positive side, we would be continuing our vacation in New Zealand.
End of part one.