We made it down to Sydney from Brisbane in good order.
Some quick facts: Sydney - capital city of New South Wales (but not the capital of Australia which many people assume, which is Canberra). Its population is roughly 4.6 million. This makes it the largest city in Australia - just beating out Melbourne at 4.2 million (this is the reason that the capital was a newly created city - essentially a compromise on the part of Sydney and Melbourne). Sydney is also the site of the first British colony in Australia - 1788. The "First Fleet" was a collection of convicts and their keepers that colonized the area in 1788 after Captain James Cook mapped out the area for the British Empire in 1770.
Sunday we ran into a spot of bad weather - it rained most of the day. Amazingly, that is the first and only poor weather we have encountered on our entire trip! Anyway, not too much to report from our first day here Sunday as we got into town, had dinner and dodged the raindrops. We did manage to visit the Darling Harbour area as this was close to our hotel. Darling Harbour is one of the many little sub-districts of Sydney. It sits around Cockle Bay (everything here is on a bay, harbour, or some body of water) right off of downtown and the business district. You can find a number of restaurants, museums and tourist venues here. As I understand it, a lot of Darling Harbour was revitalized for the 2000 Olympics.
It is here too that we saw the first of many art rhinos currently being displayed in the city. They have a business/art program on to provide awareness about black rhinos (you can learn about the program here: http://taronga.org.au/wild-rhinos/about). Here is K pictured with one of the rhinos. With rain gear, she almost looks part of the art.
Yesterday (Monday), we did the thing that all tourists in Sydney do... we visited the Opera House, hiked the Harbour Bridge, spent some time in the Rocks neighborhood and then took in a ballet in the Opera House yesterday evening.
For those awaiting them, here are the iconic photos of the both the bridge and Opera House. Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperating, so I can't give you the great blue skies you usually see from these places.
We are hoping to be down in the Sydney Harbour several times this week, so I am hoping for some better shots when the weather cooperates.
These icons are beautiful, but the whole harbour is just amazing. The downtown area is on one side of the harbour, but Sydney and its suburbs are so big with so many attractions, boats, etc. that when you are down on the harbour it seems that everything is alive. Sights, sounds, motion, smell - all coming at you at once.
We took the Opera House tour in the morning. The building inside is just as impressive as its outside. Acoustics inside the staged areas was impeccable - even given the large hall size.
After the Opera House tour, K and I were off to our Sydney Harbour Bridge climb. In order to make sure no one accidentally (or intentionally) drops anything onto the traffic on the bridge or harbour below, there is quite a rigorous preparation and suit up process that you go through before hiking. You have to wear a jump suit that allows everything (to include glasses and hanky) to be tied to you before you make your hike. Here are K and I suited up ready to go.
The climb itself takes you under the bridge to one of the spans, then on top of the lower span up to the top/center of the bridge. Cameras are not allowed (again - nothing can be taken up that is not tied down), but the tour guide takes your picture at several spots. Here we are atop the bridge looking out toward the Opera House. You can see, the weather cleared up for our hike - thank goodness. People that morning were getting drenched (our fortune on this trip has been never ending).
They recently had the 3 millionth person climb the bridge. So it doesn't exactly put us in unique company to complete the climb - still it was quite special. K will be posting a video they took for us at the top of the bridge on Facebook.
After our hike, we toured the Rocks area. The Rocks is the area of Sydney beneath the Harbour Bridge over to the Opera House. It is part of the original Sydney colony - although the part of the city with the seediest of histories. It was the slum, housing sailors and prostitutes long before its trendy/touristy times of today. Today, it holds many restaurants, shops and even the Modern Art Gallery of Sydney (which we visited - more on this below).
After a refreshment, we visited the Museum of Contemporary Art. This modern art museum was conveniently right across the street from the old pub.
As K and I would agree after the visit, we probably didn't have enough beer to make sense out of most of the art in the building. Generally speaking, K and I are fans of the arts and even modern art (K in particular). However, the Museum of Contemporary Art pushed the envelope quite a bit - at least for us. Still we found some things pretty interesting/unique. K particularly liked some of the aboriginal art. Here were some of my favorites.
After dinner at Sake in the Rocks (a Japanese restaurant that is rated #63 out of over 5000 restaurants in all of Sydney by TripAdvisor), we were off to the Opera House again for the ballet. The Sydney Opera House has its own opera company and the ballet company is from Melbourne and performs at the Opera House a couple of times per year.. Therefore, the Opera House rarely puts on other groups/shows (save the occasional touring company, comedy show, etc.). Broadway plays, for example, are not shown in the Opera House. So, if you want to see a show at the Opera House - especially in one of the large stages (there are 5 stages in all, but 2 major stages), you are pretty much left with opera or ballet. The opera is getting ready to show and the Australian Ballet is currently performing. So, K arranged for us to see the ballet on Monday night. They put on "Manon." Our Opera House tour guide summed up most ballets this way: "boy meets girl, boy gets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back, girl dies." For those unfamiliar with ballet and Manon - suffice it to say that is a pretty good summary. Throw in the fact that it is set largely in France and Louisiana and you have the plot.
The Opera House the night of Manon
The Harbor Bridge from the Sydney Opera House during intermission
Folks, I am not a ballet person. I have no business commenting on the performance - especially from a talent standpoint. Having said that, the show was entertaining for me. First and foremost, you find yourself saying - "I am sitting in the Sydney Opera House... in Australia... watching a ballet show." How many people can say that? You feel lucky and privileged to be able to do that. Secondly, I found this show to be entertaining in that it had a pretty large cast with a lot of dancers in each act. So there was a lot of things to watch in the sidelines if you did not find the dance at the time to be entertaining. I also liked watching the audience (presumably largely an Australian group) enjoy the show. An obviously sophisticated audience with regard to ballet, but otherwise you would have sworn you were in any other city in the world. People doing way too much with their smartphones, mothers trying to keep kids in line, and mostly men just trying to stay awake during the show. Fun people watching. The world is a small place. So if you come to Sydney - do yourself a favor - go to a show, whatever it is - just for the experience. You'll thank yourself when it is over.
We were not allowed to take pictures during the show, so if anyone wants more info or pictures, you'll have to visit here: http://www.sydneyoperahouse.com/whatson/tab_2014_manon.aspx. One note for those planning a visit to Sydney and the Opera House: you may want to dress up a bit. K and I have been able to dress very casually throughout our trip. Most in NZ and Australia are welcoming no matter what you wear, but K and I did feel a little underdressed for the occasion in our casual city-hiking clothes. There were plenty of people in jeans and dressed-down form, but you will find most are dressed pretty nicely. Something to consider if you visit.
Today K and I visited the Blue Mountains (west of Sydney). I'll report more on that tomorrow, and we still have the rest of the week in Sydney so more to come from our visit here.
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