Adventures of Beth and Dan: “Live, travel, adventure, bless, and don’t be sorry.”- Jack Kerouac

Sydney is a magical place with the opera house and the iconic bridge. We dock at White Bay which is quite a distance from the opera house. We will dock here because we are a smaller ship and larger ships take precedence over us. The Celebrity Solstice was docked when we pulled in.

The currency in Australia is the Aussie dollar.

We plan to do the hop on bus and just see the city. The Harbour Bridge is one of the worlds largest steel bridges and one of their landmarks with more than 6 million rivets !! There is 53 thousand tons of steel in the bridge with 8 lanes of traffic , a railway and a bike lane. You can also walk across. It was finished in 1932. Locals call it the Hangar because it looks like a coat hangar. They have a tour where you can walk up over the bridge!!! On top of it! You have to be committed and there is no turning back.

Shopping in Sydney is over the top. They say lightening fast Wi-Fi is at the Apple Store :). You can download almost anything in a snap. Wi-Fi is available almost everywhere. They have beautiful botanical gardens too close to the public library. Lovely beaches outline the ocean coast areas with golden sand, kayaking,surfing and shopping. Manly Beach is one and also the Gold Coast. Bonis Beach is another fantastic beach. Some you have to access by ferry. The Taronga Zoo is there too which has over 4000 animals with 350 species. It means beautiful view. You take a ferry boat to get there. The view from it is fantastic they say. You can take boat tours or hop on boat cruises too. Circular Caye is the name of the area where the boats are in Darling Harbor. Darling used to House the railway good site and commercial boats but now it is full of busy shops, attractions and places to eat and drink. The Chinese garden on friendship is a lovely place to stroll with the typical yin and yang feel.

There is a great museum of their sea history and Captain Cook in the harbor area. They have a vessel made of beer cans!!

In Sydney they have diagonal crossing at major street lights!

Some people will travel to the Blue Mountains which a UNESCO site with the famous three sisters. There is a tribal story about this concerning aboriginal live between two tribes that was forbidden. The sisters were turned into stone to save them from being killed during the battles. We spend two days in Sydney and some folks will go off ship and get a hotel so that they can see and do more. The first day we took the hop on bus and we got off at The Rocks area for lunch and a little exploring. Then we explored the Opera House and the Botanical Gardens taking a little train through the park with narration. The park was beautiful with many areas to sit and take in lovely views.

The next day we took the shuttle into Darling Harbour and went to Marine Museum touring a battleship, a submarine, and an old sailing vessel. We also watched a 3-D movie about multi nation war fleets. Our sail away was about 6 that night and we watched it all from the Crows Nest. The sail out was lovely and they made it more special for folks who just joined the ship. We lost 120 passengers in Sydney and took in about 80 so we are not a full ship heading back to San Diego. Some have said we will be less than 1000 passengers. That is good for us! We had another pillow gift and it was the best one yet!! Each of us got a portable power bank that we can use to recharge our electronic devices like cell phones, pads, computers and kindles.

We also achieved Three Star stays with HAL which is really no big deal for us. The percs with three star aren’t impressive. You really don’t get much in return until you are 4 ir 5 star when you get free laundry service and lots of savings on onboard items like drinks, dinner packages and the stores. But we probably will never get to that status and that’s ok with us. Our three sea days after Sydney were cool and cloudy. No one was on deck three in loungers reading. It was too cold and blustery. Two new guest speakers came onboard. One is a NOAA (former) employee speaking about our One World Ocean. He is ok. He uses mostly NOAA slides. The other is Beth Foggin. She is a university professor from Canada and she is speaking about Australian Exiles from the US and Canada that were sent there to their prisons. We haven’t found her talks to interest that much. We have had new entertainers including a concert pianist, several singing groups and a new act by the singers and dancers. Movies have been good :). Our next port is Waitangi, New Zealand!!