21-23 November 2023
We couldn’t travel all that way and transit through Sydney twice without arranging to see my husband’s cousin and her husband. They do live 5-6 hours drive away from Sydney (almost 500km by the fastest driving route) but that’s only a short distance in this vast country. They agreed to travel to Sydney and stay in a hotel to explore the city with us.
Our alarm clock went off before 04.00am in Wellington in readiness to check in for a flight departing at 06.20am. As we were in World Traveller Plus, we enjoyed an upgrade to business class for this leg of the journey so we made full use of the excellent and almost deserted airport lounge to eat an early breakfast. The second breakfast on the plane started with champagne and I spent the journey watching “The Miracle Club” which had been released under six weeks earlier in UK cinemas.
At Sydney my bag wasn’t on the luggage belt – despite being the same as my husband’s it had been deemed “oversize”. However the delay in us realising this and retrieving it saved time; we were approached by a roving official conducting biosecurity checks and after discussion were deemed fit to proceed through “Nothing to Declare” with our papers stamped appropriately by her. Hence we didn’t have to queue to declare our well scrubbed outdoor equipment and our sachets of instant coffee.
We paid for an early hotel check-in and then headed off to Circular Quay to meet Lee and Glen. Circular Quay is the hub of transportation, entertainment and dining in Sydney’s Central Business District. We took in views of the iconic Sydney harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House before walking past the Opera House and round the harbour walkway.
We walked all the way to Mrs Macquarie’s Chair which was carved out of sandstone in the early 1800s for Governor Lachlan Macquarie’s wife. We walked back through the botanic gardens where we saw numerous birds (including a kookaburra which was very exciting!) and trees as well as a dragon lizard all of which we had never seen previously.
We enjoyed an early dinner (even the second breakfast was a long time away) at an excellent Italian restaurant on Circular Quay. After dinner we visited the Sydney Tower Eye Observation Deck to enjoy awesome 360 degree views of the city and surroundings from the tallest building in Sydney. As we were booked for the bridge climb the next day we decided not to attempt the sky walk.
After a night’s sleep we were ready for our climb. Glen had decided beforehand not to join the climb so the three of us gathered with eleven other participants. After an introduction and safety briefing, we were breathalysed then kitted up with dungarees, a climbing harness and a radio receiver with headphones. Everything had to be fixed and clipped securely even spectacles and a sunhat. Wrist watches aren’t permitted in case they fall off. We practised the technique for ascending and descending ladders with a short demonstration before trying ourselves. Having been deemed competent. we progressed to the real thing.
The streets, gardens and buildings were soon far below us even though we were still below the road deck. We discovered that the huge sandstone faced pylons have no structural function but were built to improve the aesthetics and to make the bridge look stronger. We squeezed through a few gaps then climbed a series of four ladders to go above the road at the start of the upper arch. From there the summit is in sight. Altogether it’s 1332 steps but there are lots of halts to take in the views so I was surprised how easy it was to get to the top. Our guide takes up to three tours per day. We relied on her for the photos as we weren’t permitted to take our own cameras.
We crossed the bridge at the summit, where further photos were taken, to descend on the west side near the railway line. We were very fortunate to enjoy excellent weather conditions – not too hot but it was sunny with good visibility and only a gentle breeze.
After our successful climb, during which we worked up an appetite, we met up with Glen and visited The Australian, one of Sydney’s oldest pubs in the Rocks area. My husband and I shared a large Coat of Arms pizza (half kangaroo and half emu) – a traditional speciality of the pub.
We strolled through The Rocks, a historic part of the city and the core of the original settlement of Sydney, founded in 1788 on the land of the Gadigal people.
We arrived back down at Circular Quay where we caught a ferry to Cockatoo Island, now an UNESCO World heritage site and the largest island in Sydney Harbour. During the 60,000 years prior to European settlement, Cockatoo Island was a meeting place for Sydney’s First Nations Peoples, who know it as Wareamah.
From the mid-nineteenth century, the island has had different uses. It was the site of a convict gaol from 1839 to 1869 and a major shipbuilding and repair facility from 1857 to 1991, with dock workers supporting the Allied powers during both World Wars. Additionally, between 1871 and 1911, the island hosted educational institutions including an industrial training school for girls, a reformatory for young women and nautical school ships for boys. In 2000, an Aboriginal rights group established a camp on the island to support a land claim. There is a lot to see!
Our last full day in Sydney had arrived. My husband and I made the journey out to the famous Bondi Beach, a huge expanse of sand with excellent surf. We saw some surfers attempting to ride the surf before setting off on an undulating coastline walk to Cougee Beach. I even changed into my swimming costume to swim in a natural tidal pool on Bronte Beach.
We were fortunate that it didn’t start raining until we were at Cougee waiting for the bus back to the city centre. We made a brief visit to the Museum of Contemporary Art to look at some interesting art including bark pictures, “first jobs” and “fourth at the Sidney Olympics” as well as some unusual installations and rooftop views of Sidney.
The huge cruise ship “Ovation of the Seas” had followed us again and was moored in the harbour.
We met up with Lee and Glen for an early evening dinner cruise around Sidney Harbour. While we ate our dinner we were able to gaze out at changing views of the iconic Sidney landmarks which we had been looking at for the past couple of days.
It was sad to say a last good-bye to Lee and Glen, but our appetites have been whetted with this short visit to Australia and we are planning a longer visit in the future. Our extended holiday to the Southern Hemisphere had definitely come to an end, but we had certainly done enough in the past few days in Sidney to create long term positive memories.
Where's Kathryn? 