HOLIDAY - Sydney

Tuesday, July 8 – I love Sydney!!! There are just certain cities that really appeal to me, and this is one of them. Too bad it’s listed as one of the top 10 most expensive places to live in the world…We walked down to the harbor area and I just loved the city feel. It’s quite a bit colder than Cairns. We started the tourism with a tour of the Opera House. Our guide was like 5 feet tall and hyped on caffeine and hilarious. I enjoyed the tour and we got to see the 2 main theaters as well as a smaller one. After pictures we went to Circular Quay which is the main wharf and we took a ferry to Manly. We were making jokes the whole time about how manly Manly is.  We didn’t do too much there, but we walked some on a scenic pathway that was beautiful. I wish we could have gone farther but we had to make it back so we could get to the bridge in time to do the Bridge Climb! We had the best time. There is lots of equipment that you have to put on but we were the first group of all the groups schedules to go at our time for the night climb, so we got to climb up when the sun was setting and see different perspectives as it became dark. LOVED IT! It was a little nerve wracking at some places, but I loved the experience overall. We got a free hat at the end of it and we bought a couple photos as souvenirs. Such an amazing experience. Then we started the long walk back to Hyde Park and we were exhausted and didn’t know where to eat (we have limited budgets...hence eating the same stuff over and over haha) so we ended up having kebab again and sharing some chips. Not bad.

Opera House tour

One of the theaters in the Opera House

Enjoying my burrito...since they barely exist in Australia.

Scenic walk at Manly

Manly beach muscles.

Wednesday,  July 9 – Oh my gosh, this day. We were supposed to have our Blue Mountains tour and get picked up like all the rest of the tours that we have gone on. Only when we got to the meet up place we stood there for 30 minutes and no one was there. We finally called them and found out they were there at the designated time (7:35am), waited for 5 minutes but didn’t see us so they left, but if we took a taxi to Darling Harbor the coach would try to wait for us. Well, I think we got there about 2-3 minutes too late because after spending $22 on a taxi they were not there and we had no idea what to do. Because we weren’t going to get refunds and Mom was not happy at all. We eventually found the Gray Line people who were trying to be accommodating but couldn’t really do much. They told us we could try and meet our group up at Scenic World which was part of the tour and we wouldn’t really miss much, but to do that we would have to take several modes of transportation to get there. Mom was really iffy, but we decided to go for it and if we didn’t meet up with them at least we could see the Blue Mountains. Super annoying though. So we hurried onto the Light Rail which would take us to Central Train station where we would take a 2 hour train to Katoomba after which we would have to find a way to get the rest of the way to Scenic World and meet our group where they were having lunch. So we did all that: the Light Rail, the train ride, and a bus. We were supposed to get off the bus at the car park at Scenic World, but we ended up getting off a stop too early at the Skyway Rail and got to ride across on that (which we apparently weren’t supposed to), but we had no idea what else to do! We were both getting pretty frustrated at this point because we had been playing catch-up the whole morning when we never should have been and had spent another $52 between the two of us that we should not have had to and we didn’t even know if we were going to meet the group. We had to talk to the people where we were supposed to show our wristband or pay the money, and they were skeptical when we explained the situation but we eventually met our driver. Poor guy, he probably hated us hahaha! Then they told us lunch wasn’t included when our tickets said it was. So they worked with us and so we didn’t have to pay an extra $20/person to eat food, and we scarfed some lunch and got to join our group for the rest of the tour. Hallelujah. We got to see an Aboriginal presentation with some cool dances and their horn instrument, then see the Three Sisters at Echo Point, then drive down to another wildlife place called Featherdale. The animals here were awesome and wide awake!! We saw bats at feeding time, little penguins, more kangaroos and koalas (even some albino kangaroos), dingos, emus, a Tasmanian devil running laps (literally), a million birds, a echidna, a saltwater croc, and probably some more that I don’t remember. It’s been really cool to go to all the different wildlife places because they’ve all been different. Then we got dropped back off at our hostel and we ate Subway and it had FOUNTAIN DRINKS!! With ice, straws, and refills!!! Oh my goodness, the things we take advantage of in America. State of Origin game 3 was also on tonight, and mom wasn’t feeling so great so we watched it back in the room. It was great to see Queensland win the game. They actually killed it!! But NSW won the first 2 games so they won the series, but that’s ok.

Aboriginal show.


I got picked out of the crowd for part of it!

3 sisters...celebrating us 3 girls in my family!

Featherdale Wildlife Park

Bats

Cassowary

Wombat

Kangaroos

Tasmanian devil

Saltwater croc

Little penguin

Emu

Loooooooong day.

I LOVE SYDNEY!!!

Thursday, July 10 – Travel day again. We walked a bit around Hyde Park before catching our shuttle to the airport. We flew to Auckland today and that took most of the day. The plane ride was uneventful (always a good thing) and we took a shuttle bus to the city to our hostel, Nomad Fat Camel. A very interesting place. The walls are paper thin, it leaves a lot to be desired (you get what you pay for), and we’re right in the middle of a bunch of bars. Hahaha! Such an interesting place. I’m sure it’s quite nice out there. Looking forward to our tour tomorrow.

HOLIDAY - Cairns

Thursday, July 3 – We took our first airplane and made out way to Cairns! It looks a lot like Hawaii here apparently. We got checked into our hostel, Queens Court, then walked down to the main part of town. Cairns is pretty small, only about a 160,000 population I guess (but a huge place for tourism), so we walked to the Esplanade and ate Kebab and I got a mango smoothie after and mom got gelato and we came back and chilled because we knew the next few days were going to be busy.

Friday, July 4 – Happy birthday America!! We woke up early and got picked up for our river rafting adventure! I had never been, but the Tully River is a grade 4 river and it was a great day. It took us about 2 hours 40 minutes of driving from Cairns to make it to the top of the gorge where we started rafting. Our guide, Leon, is a legitimate hippie with crazy dreadlocks and he had an awesome hippie hat on in the bus that I wanted. Our raft had us, a guy from Cairns, a guy from Korea, and a father/son from Holland, so we had some good variety and lots of strength which was great. The rapids were fairly intense at some parts but it was way fun. I literally almost fell out once (my foot was wedged in somewhere but I was falling backwards but they grabbed me back before I could completely lose it – it was very close though haha). On one rapid Leon wanted us to fall out so he put us all at the front of the raft sitting side by side holding each other and we all flipped out hard. It was actually pretty scary for me because I ran into the rocks at the edge of the bank, hitting/dragging my elbow really hard and then once I was free of that I was twirling in the water for a bit before I could finally kick my way up. My shoes fell off too haha. But yeah, it was fairly intense for me and shook me up a bit. The weather was on and off sunny and cloudy and rainy, but I wasn’t really cold until after that because I was so stiff the rest of the way haha. Now my elbow has a grand bump on it and is already lovely shades of purple. We’ll see how it looks tomorrow. There was a BBQ lunch on the bank during the trip, and for dinner we went to McDonald’s again so we could get free WiFi hahaha. We felt very American and celebrated the 4^th that way. Fireworks will happen next year, but everyone at home will be having a fun night! I can’t be too jealous of that, because I’m in Australia.

These aren't my pictures because obviously I didn't have a camera with me, but this is the Tully River!! That's exactly what we were doing. Thank goodness for google images haha.

Some scenery on the drive back to Cairns from the river. I'm told it looks like Hawaii, there were sugar cane and banana trees everywhere.

Battle wound...OUCH

Saturday, July 5 – Today we walked down to the wharf and took the Big Cat boat out to Green Island. It was about an hour boat ride away from Cairns, and I believe it is the closest island to the city that you can go to. We got some snorkel equipment and when we got there the water was beautiful and clear and it was so windy when we first got off of the boat! But people were snorkeling with and without wetsuits, so we figured it couldn’t be too cold in there. The last time I snorkeled was at Eilat at the Red Sea which was a cool experience, but the water was clearer here and it was bearably chilly. We snorkeled in two different spots and saw lots of fish and coral! I think when I pictured what it would be like snorkeling at the Great Barrier Reef I pictured more of what it would be like scuba diving, so it wasn’t as colorful as I thought it was going to be, but it was still a cool experience! We didn’t find Nemo though haha. We ate lunch on the boat then went on a glass bottom boat tour for 30 minutes where we got to see a lot more fish and different kinds of coral that were farther from the beach, then we went back on the island and walked around on the beach and watched the birds dive bomb to catch fish which was hilarious. The boat ride back was nice as well and we went back to the room to get cleaned up before we went back down by the Esplanade and ate kebab again (Mom really likes kebab!) and went into a photography art studio by a guy named Michael Seebeck (I couldn’t get over the fact how similar it was to Michael Sobeck) and I bought a beautiful picture of a storm in the outback. I love it and I can’t wait to have my “wall” someday in my future home! It will have my Western Wall photo, my Egyptian canvas, I’ll find a picture of Italy to print and frame, and I’ll probably put my flags up as well. J It’s going to be my travel wall and be bellissima!!!

Sunday, July 6 – Today was Daintree day! Our guide picked us up and we did many things today. It was a harder day for me because I wasn’t feeling too good but lots of fun things happened. Our first stop was the Port Douglas wildlife habitat place. It divided the animals into 3 sections (rainforest, grasslands, and wetlands). I found Peter, my new best friend. He’s a wallaby and the friendliest thing.  We also saw our first cassowaries and lots of other animals, many of which were sleeping. Next stop was Mossman Gorge, where we took a bus up into the forest and walked down to a river and a couple other points. This was our first intimate experience with the rainforest. It’s kind of depressing because pictures really can’t do it justice – they’ll all look pretty much the same but the forest is so dense and green and awesome!! Then we drove to Cape Tribulation which is way out in the middle of nowhere of the rainforest (I think our guide said it was around 135 km north of Cairns – on very windy roads). It’s one of only 2 places I think where the rainforest comes right out to the beach but also where the reef comes all the way to the shore. Pretty cool spot – we ate lunch there and then walked out on the beach for a bit and it was lovely. After that we drove back and found the Daintree River where we got on a boat and for about an hour we looked for crocodiles and other wildlife. The Daintree is a salt river and so there are saltwater crocs and bull sharks swimming in there, so you very likely won’t make it out alive if you fall in…yikes. We saw a few crocs (including a juvenile one and another one we watched climb onto the river bank…that was cool) and birds. After the river tour we drove to a lookout point and then finally back to Cairns. It was a very very full day and we were exhausted afterward. Even though we didn’t go to church we thought it was cool to see lots of nature. We walked back to the Esplanade after we got just to get some smoothies for dinner and then went to bed.

Cassowary - Port Douglas Wildlife Reserve

This is Peter :)

Mossman Gorge

Cape Tribulation

Juveline croc - Daintree River

Monday, July 7 – Travel day. Our flight from Cairns to Sydney wasn’t until evening, so we had a lot of the day but no major plans. We woke up early to watch the sunrise at the beach (I admit that I do like California beach sunsets better…you don’t have to wake up early for them!) and then I went for a run after. It felt really good to get some intentional exercise in, but I almost regretted doing that with all the walking we ended up doing the rest of the day. We walked super far to go the Botanical Gardens (the receptionist lied and told us was only 5 blocks…that was a loooooong 5 blocks!) The Gardens were really pretty but I didn’t really eat breakfast because I thought we were going to eat earlier and after running and walking I was hangry! Oh well, we made the long walk back and mom found a different kebab place that was close to our room and Pizza Hut was right next to it so I ate some pizza which I had been craving. We walked some more and saw a beautiful Catholic church that had huge stained glass windows, then down to the Esplanade one more time to get some souvenirs, then back to catch our shuttle to the airport. Mom left her jacket though and didn’t realize it until after we went through security, so that was a downer, but then we flew our way to Sydney! Didn’t get in until late so we didn’t explore, just checked in to our hostel Y Hyde Park.

Cairns is an awesome place!!! I enjoyed our time there a lot, no regrets! Next stop, Sydney!!!