syd’s knees

well, this morning the rain had stopped coming down (at least outside our house) and my flight to Sydney was fine.  although there was a slight technical hitch when i got to the front of the checkin queue after 30 minutes to be told i needed a visa to get to Australia.  Oops.  luckily that was easily sorted at the info desk, and i queue jumped my way back to the front.

the flight was good.  i watched coraline which was jolly good.  p’haps a bit scarey for the very little ones.  everything else on the airplane selection seemed to have gratuitous unsuitableness or violence as i found out to my surprise when watching an episode of Outrageous Fortunes.  It’s a local TV show that the wife of my work colleague who was hosting the BBQ writes for.  it was good, but a little ‘earthy’ you might say.

Sydney is also in the christmas spirit with a few big christmas trees around the place.  it’s been very hot today (mid/high 20s i recon plus very humid) so it’s all very strange.

my hotel is next to the monorail which means there’s a rumbling every 10 minutes or so.  but i quite like that in a hotel.

anyway, this morning i went up one of the pylons of the harbour bridge, and walked along the roadside (you can go over the top next to where the flags are, but that takes 3 hours)

there’s a nice view of the sydney opera house from up there

after that i got a train, then a bus to the world famous bondi beach.

world famous for its life guards of course.  here they are keeping an eye on people

i got there about 4pm but the place was still buzzing.  plenty of people in the sea attempting to surf

and i think this might be what a packed beach looks like over here

Sydney is a funny place.  it’s got a lot more older buildings than Auckland (when i say old, think 100 years max, but made of brick).  And the streets all have rather strangely familiar names.

When the taxi driver found out i used to work in london he said “we have all british names here from london like Oxford Street, Liverpool Street, Paddington, Kings Cross, Elizabeth Street”.  

I told him that London doesn’t have a famous Elizabeth Street, but he corrected me by saying it must have because it’s the queen’s name.  Then pointed to George Street.   That’s George from Rainbow i think.

on the way back i got a bus and a boat

here’s a boat like the one i got.  probably not the actual one.

this evening i went up the funny tower on a stick in the middle of this picture.  They were really slow and rubbish at letting people in so by the time i got up there it was dark which meant no pictures.  sorry about that.

And then a huge group of tourists arrived with their far eastern cameras and shouted and squashed all over the place, so i gave up and came down.  but that was the only bit of wasted day i think.

tomorrow i’m thinking of going to Manly Beach.  You can make your own jokes up about that.

good bye for now.  and the title was related to the amount of walking i’ve done today.  forgot to mention that.