Sydney Tuesday 18th February

Posted byvwhitesidePosted inUncategorized

A city coach tour of Sydney this morning followed by a harbour lunch cruise.

All on the coach in good time and off we went.
Summer uniform for Sydney boys.
First stop, the Royal Botanic Gardens.
The Royal Botanic Gardens.
Mrs Macquarie’s chair.
It’s a ladies only seat.
The chair was carved out of a sandstone rock ledge by convicts in 1810.
It was commissioned by Governor Macquarie for his wife Elizabeth.
It provides one of the best vantage points to view the sights of Sydney Harbour.
He succeeded Governor Bligh, of mutiny on the Bounty. Bligh’s attempt to stamp out corruption in the colony had led to the “Rum Rebellion” in 1808
Art Gallery of New South Wales.
On the way to Bondi Beach
A quick back way in.
Absolutely stunning.
We can never resist a paddle.
Many young folk were in the sea waiting for waves but we only saw one manage to surf for a few seconds.
Wish you were here with your board Jamie?
Lovely soft, clean sand.
Some of our group “chewing the fat” on Bondi Beach
All heading back to the coach.
Time to board for our Top Deck Lunch Cruise of the harbour.
I think we were expecting some sort of basic buffet. It was much more upmarket.
I had Tiger prawns followed by fillet steak with a glass of wine. The food was excellent.
Good company too.
Some views from the Sky Deck.
Peter offered to take my photo: his photographic composition skills leave something to be desired, as does my hair!
He did a bit better here.
The temperature in Sydney is mostly very comfortable.
The tall building under construction will be a 6 star hotel. This means butler service for all!
There are 3 or 4 projections into the harbour like this. I’m not sure if they are apartments.
Sailing under Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Note the walkers on the top. A number of our group did the climb later in the day.
Fiona and Rob getting rigged up for their climb in the afternoon. They said there were scary moments.

Michelle and Ian were the last to climb. It is quite arduous; several sets of 40 or more steep steps as well as steady uphill walking. It was late evening and they were caught in a thunderstorm on the way back down. They were a bit traumatised!

After our cruise we chose to stay in The Rocks and look around.
We visited the Contemporary Art Museum.
This is by a Torres Straits islander.
It tells the story of a Badu Island song and dance.
The story is about the pearl diving industry which existed between 1860 and 1960.
After cooling ginger beers on the Art Gallery roof, we set off to walk over the Harbour Bridge back to our hotel.
We climbed a lot of stairs but found a lift for the last bit.
Just reaching the actual bridge.
Bumped into fellow travellers yet again; Mair (very Welsh) took this photo.
Sydney Harbour Bridge
Nearly at the end.
A welcome lift down to street level.
We sat on a bench in the shade, admiring this Ibis, contemplating possible routes back to the hotel.
Fortunately Karen and Neil appeared and showed us the way home.
We could have found our own way but we may have taken a few wrong turns on the way. As we had already walked over 5 miles in the heat we were glad to be guided.
This view of our hotel car park explained the frequent rumbles from beneath us; the hotel is built over the railway tunnel!
We had a bar snack in the hotel in the evening.
We chose Port to finish the evening. When others joined us the service was so poor we all finished up with complimentary drinks. We chose port on ice this time.

Everyone keeps saying farewell as the group will separate tomorrow as we disperse to Hong Kong, Dubai, Bali or Singapore for our homebound stopovers. There is an awful lot of hugging going on!

Another great day. Tomorrow is our last day in Australia.

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