Sydney, Australia

DAY 1

Sydney is the most populous city in Australia with a metropolitan area population of over 4.2 million people. It is the state capital of New South Wales and is located on the country's southeast coast. It was the first European colony in Australia, established in 1788. Sydney Harbor is the largest natural harbor in the world.

We actually arrived in Sydney on February 9th, around midnight. There was a medical emergency with someone who needed to be moved to a hospital, so the Captain sped up and arrived 7 hours earlier than planned. We were not allowed off the ship until 7 a.m. on the 10th. We of course, did not disembark until around 9. We immediately headed to the Opera House which was right across Circle Quay (key), where we were berthed. Really great place to be! We went on the 10:00 tour which lasted about 45 minutes. It's quite the structure! It would be interesting to see a performance there. What amazed me is that they have a different show there every day! On matinee days, they will do 2 different ones in one day....unlike the San Francisco theaters which have performances lasting weeks, or even months.

After the Opera House we walked on the border of the Botanical Gardens. Someone at our table had told us that a lot of bats hang in the trees there so I walked looking up for quite some time with no luck. No bats. There were some unusual birds walking around though. Probably unusual for me, not for the Australians! We were told that the main streets in Sydney are Pitt and George so we cut across town to Pitt Street and headed up it, away from the harbor. Sydney has maintained many of their old buildings, so they are interspersed with tall modern buildings, very interesting. The sidewalks were loaded with business folks on their lunch hour. Kind of hard to get thru. We stopped and did some shopping, grabbed a bite to eat, then went to George Street which runs parallel to Pitt, and headed back toward the harbor. We did go thru the Queen Victoria Building which has been preserved and turned into an upscale mall. Beautiful building. All this was a lot of walking so when we arrived back at the ship, both of us were quite exhausted. We had to get ready for a shore excursion, so napping was out!

Our excursion was arranged by HAL, and included in our fare as suite guests. Everyone from the 6th and 7th floors were invited, so there were about 150 people. We headed to the zoo on the first bus only to discover that we were early, so the driver took us on a short tour. That made us be the last bus to arrive. There was an elevator to the tram which held only a few people, so many were walking up the steps...in the pouring rain. Once off the tram which took us over the entire zoo (we saw an elephant and lots of trees) there was no one to tell us where to go so we kind of followed World Cruise umbrellas we saw in the distance. We found a group with a guide and stayed with them for a bit then went to another building where there was another group. We didn't know we were supposed to be in a group because there weren't enough people to direct us! We did see the nocturnal animals in the one building. They have a lot of different kinds of rats in Australia! We saw a number of animals I'd never seen before, some I'd never heard of before. We also saw the koalas, one was just waking up, so a great photo opp, even in the rain.

We then headed to a building for dinner. They finally served a nice salad, then took over an hour to get our main course! People were either getting very irritated or very drunk, with wine flowing freely. Once the food did arrive, either salmon or beef, we were told if we wanted the other dish, to trade with someone! We weren't given a choice! Very weird. Once back in the bus we sat and sat, waiting to leave. Saw an ambulance go by and later learned that a woman had fallen on the steps and cracked her head open. We were back at the ship at about 10, and VERY long and frustrating excursion.

DAY 2

After such a LONG day, we slept in a bit. We headed for the Sydney Harbor Bridge to climb the pylon for a great view of the city. You can climb to the top of the bridge but I declined. Heights aren't my friend. To get to the bridge we had to walk thru the Rocks which is an area they have kept as it was in the early years of the city. They converted the old buildings into malls, galleries, hotels and many restaurants. It was a very nice place to shop. We arrived at the bridge pylon and started up. It was about 3 flights just to get to the ticket booth. Friends had climbed the bridge the day before and gave us pylon tickets that they couldn't use. That was nice. It said there were 200 steps, but they had things to look at frequently, so it didn't seem like much of a climb. There was a gift shop at about the 7th level. Wouldn't want to work there! The view from the top was great. We took a LOT of pictures. They will be in our next PhotoShow. I hope to get that uploaded in the next few days. After the pylon, we returned to the ship for lunch and to get rid of jackets and packages. It was finally a nice day. We returned to the Rocks for more shopping then walked along the wharf just watching people and taking pictures.

We have a new dinner table! Ester and Bob from our old table had friends joining them in Sydney so we had to move. Our new table is for 10, with 9 sitting there now. One woman has been sitting there by herself since Ft Lauderdale, kind of strange. The other 6 just joined the cruise in Sydney. It's hard having everyone included in the same conversation with a table that large. Not sure how it's going to work out, or if we'll stay. We'll give it a few days. We do miss our old table already. We left dinner early to be up on deck for sail away. It was really beautiful sailing out of Sydney Harbor. The sun even came out a bit while we were leaving. Sydney reminded us a lot of San Francisco. It's a beautiful city, one we would like to return to someday.