Sydney

Word can’t come close to fairly describing our stay so far in Australia! I had heard that Australia was a great country to visit but there is no way to do justice to it with mere words.

As I sit at the computer to start this blog, I am looking out the window at the magnificent world-famous Sydney Opera House. What a spectacular view we have for three days in Sydney. Our primary focus is on the Opera House, but we also see the shops and wharf as well as ferries plying between this part of Sydney and other areas. Since it is November, the sun is shining and the temperatures are warm with the spring trees and flowers in bloom. In Barb’s last blog, she mentioned the purple jacaranda trees which we see in profusion here. Like some of our flowering trees in the spring, best time for jacaranda is late October and early November.

Let me back up and not get ahead of the story. On Halloween morning, nearly the whole ship was up at about 5:45 to view the beautiful sail-in to Sydney Harbor. The bow was opened to guests as were all the decks and commentary was broadcast so we could have everything pointed out to us. As soon as the first glimpse of the bridge and then the top of the Opera came into view, everyone was snapping the first of thousands of pictures people must have taken. Even those crew members and other employees that could break away from duties were out since for some, it was their first visit to Sydney too. After 20 consecutive weeks of Alaska (Seattle to Seattle), they have enjoyed the change – and the warmer temperatures. Our assistant dining steward drew the “duty” of serving coffee and pastries at the front of the ship. As we drew nearer and nearer, the Opera House and bridge became larger, first both directly in front of us and then our large ship slipped into the Circular Quay between the Opera and bridge. This time both sides of the ship have a view. We look directly at the Opera while the starboard side has the bridge and parklands to watch. Some of us decided that we would move the ship around so sometime today, we should switch great views!

Halloween morning, we decided to do a half day city tour so we could comprehend what Sydney had to offer – and it is a lot! We started out driving through “The Rocks”. Our tour description said “Australia’s most historic enclaves sits in the shadow of the Harbour Bridge and exhibits the heritage of two centuries in its narrow, twisting streets.” The old homes are well maintained, many of which look like the row houses we see all over Britain. Many had flowering jacaranda and other delicate trees lining the street. From there, we moved into the part of the city with a mixture of stately Victorian era buildings (government buildings, museums, shops, and pubs) with a mixture of modern high rise structures and sculptures.

This brought us back to the Sydney Opera House for an inside tour. When looking at the winning architectural design, some see ocean waves, others see sails, and still others, shells. We obtained our tickets and met our guide who gave us earphones so she could talk to us and everyone could hear! After viewing a very brief video on the history of the building of the Opera, we first saw a smaller performance center which could operate as a theater in the round if so desired but because of movable seats, it could serve other functions as well. Then we were treated an inside view of the main theater of the opera, and while our guide explained the theater to us, we watched the workmen setting the stage for that evening’s performance of The Mikado. If there was any opera (in this case, an operetta) that I would have enjoyed, it was The Mikado. It brought back long ago memories of when I was a senior in high school and our school musical was The Mikado. I can’t think of The Mikado without thinking of my good friend from high school, Merlin Lawson, who played the role of the Mikado way back then…. We did speak to several people who attended (it costs big bucks to attend) and they said it was outstanding and unforgettable.

Following our tour of Opera House, we were on the road again for more touring of Sydney including some of the expensive homes along the waterfront and a stop at Sydney’s famous Bondi Beach. After our cool Chicago summer, it has been great enjoying the warm temperatures of an Australian spring. Some days we have been exceeding temperatures in places like Phoenix and Tampa, much less Chicago and Buffalo! By the way, we were told that Sydney has approximately the same latitude as Los Angeles and Atlanta do in the Northern Hemisphere.

Upon our return from our half day tour, Barb and I went off on our separate ways. Both of us had tasks we wanted to accomplish that didn’t involve each other. I did a bit of shopping in their weekend market, again conveniently located a short distance from our ship. And I accomplished my primary objective of getting a haircut! After dinner, Barb and I took a fairly short walk to admire the city at dusk and to see the lights on the Opera House and our ship.

On Sunday, we were off on a half day excursion to the Koala Park near Sydney. Barb is an animal lover and looks for every opportunity to find excursions that include wildlife. I enjoy them too and especially like the Australian type which naturally they feature here. The sleepy koalas actually opened their eyes to stare at their guests as we watched them back. We likewise enjoyed watching the kangaroos doing what kangaroos do! Here we saw several who had their joeys in their pouches. Usually it was just a foot sticking out but one obliged us by poking its head out so we could see it the way we had pictured kangaroos. Not being very knowledgeable about kangaroos, we had a misconception that some of you may also have. We wrongly assumed that the pouch was horizontal to the body and that the joey rode around sitting with its little head out. Instead the pouch is a hole and it’s more vertical than horizontal. The teat is down in the pouch so the joey needs to go well into the pouch to be fed. Barb took a picture of a kangaroo and me eye to eye which I think looks a bit goofy but she has proclaimed that it’s “cute” so I think she is going to insist that it be included in the pictures. She wants to take a kangaroo home as a pet but is concerned that immigration officials wouldn’t like illegal kangaroos crossing the border. I reminded her that while the kangaroo would probably have no problem with Molly (her dog for those who don’t know), but Molly might be put off by her new companion in the house. So I think she has reluctantly given up the idea of the pet kangaroo! By the way, did you know that kangaroos are physically unable to move backwards, as are emus? That’s why the kangaroo and emu are a part of Australia’s coat of arms and their national slogan is “Advance Australia”.

After seeing the other animals we traveled though some of the 2000 Summer Olympic venues. Sydney is impressive in that it still utilizes much of its Olympic complex. That’s not a surprise in a sports-crazed country which with a population of about 22 million battles the US, China, and Russia for dominance in numbers of medals. If it were done on a per capita basis, Australia would be dominant.

We returned via the Parramatta River on a public ferry and enjoyed seeing the sailboats and expensive waterfront property all along the route. Once again, Barb and I split up after returning. Barb went shopping at The Rocks markets and I set off to check the Royal Botanical Gardens which is a short walk away. As I entered the gardens, I couldn’t believe the beauty at every turn: lush green trees and shrubs, flowers and flowering trees (including the ever-present jacarandas). As I went into one area, I heard loud screeching and birds flying around. I looked up and found, not birds, but flying foxes (bats!) all over, some flying but many just hanging upside down from the trees. There was a sign saying that the flying foxes had destroyed a number of trees in the gardens but they seemed to remain confined to one small area. As I left that area, they weren’t to be seen again. I came toward some water and found that it was a cove with a wonderful view of the back of the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. I followed the path with the ever-present view of the rear of Opera House to the now familiar location of our ship. We were drawn back to the ship for an evening entertainment from another group of Aborigines playing the haunting sounds of the didgeridoo. This group featured some rather young boys who danced (very effectively too) with the adults which also included a number of women. Another great day!

On our third and sadly, last, day in Sydney we awoke to cloudy skies which looked like a definite for rain. While disappointed, we had not had a single day when we were on land where it was predominately cloudy, much less rainy. We had scheduled a full day on a tour to the Blue Mountains, Australia’s equivalent of the Grand Canyon. We got off to a slightly late start and drove though some now familiar areas of Sydney. This itinerary included a stop at the 2000 Sydney Olympic site where we were able to get out and see the Olympic Stadium and walk among some poles which listed all of the volunteers that helped make the Sydney games so successful. In addition we saw other sites including the basketball, aquatic, and several other venues. It was most impressive to see how Sydney is utilizing so many of the structures that were a part of their Olympic games. Just last year for example, we passed several of the sites of the Athens 2004 games and they had fallen into disrepair.

Before lunch we had a quick vista stop to see the canyon from above with the major focus on what they call the “Three Sisters” which are three tall rocks soaring above the landscape. We visited two lovely towns with lively downtowns near the Blue Mountains and had our lunch in the town of Leura before heading for our major stop at “Scenic World” Here we took a cable car down the canyon. Our guide suggested we try to be on the left side as picture-taking would be better there. At the bottom we walked through a rainforest (but fortunately not the kind we did in Fiji!). A walkway had been constructed with frequent descriptions of what we were viewing which allowed us to understand some of the flora of the rainforest. As we were in the heavily tree covered rainforest we began to encounter some showers. The morning clouds had earlier given way to better weather but now showers were moving in. Our walk was nearly over and we waited for the railway to carry us back to the top. This was billed as the world’s steepest perpendicular railway. It was a short ride, but we were in a cage-like structure and purposely tilted back in our seats for safety reasons.

Our guide on this excursion was excellent and gave us commentaries about the history of Australia as well as some of the flowers and trees we saw along the way. He described several of Australia’s animal species and what their interesting mating practices are. We were amazed at his knowledge of Australian lore and he even quoted extensively from memory some lengthy poetry. Since we were departing Sydney late in the afternoon, we were scheduled for the mandatory lifeboat drills since several hundred had disembarked in Sydney and others had joined for the last half of the cruise. It is somewhat of a nuisance but we understand the necessity of the drill. Several vocal people in the front of the bus tried to persuade the driver and guide to get us back late so we could miss the 4:45 drill. Since we had gotten the late start and were scheduled to return at 4:30, being late for the drill was a possibility. Some of us told the complainers that we would be contacted for a makeup drill at the ship’s convenience the next day but these folks insisted we wouldn’t have to do it if we missed the drill. We barely returned in time to try to get to the drill, but six of us in a row set off the security alarm as we returned and had to be wanded. The system was apparently so sensitive that my glasses, watch, and belt buckle were enough to set it off and of course Barb, with all her surgical hardware, set it off too. We raced to our station for the drill and made it just in time to be counted present. We talked to a few others later who had missed the drill and were annoyed that they were going to have to do a makeup because a small handful were purposely trying to cause a delay.

As our Sydney blog suggests, our days were packed but memorable. The city is world class. Like with Brisbane, we could almost forget that we were not in a major American city. We did learn that one reason why Australia seems so similar to the US was that the Aussies felt a bit let down by the British in the 1950s when Australia felt the threat of Communism in Southeast Asia and it was the US, rather than the British, that tended to be more supportive of the Australian concerns.

Barb and I have tended to do two ports each, but since there was much to say about Cairns and Brisbane; she broke them into two shorter blogs. Since Sydney was such a major destination with three days, I have done that one in one lengthy blog. She will do our last two Australian ports in Melbourne and Hobart, Tasmania. We will be sad to leave Australia but will look forward to exploring New Zealand!

Chuck