 Sydney has some interesting fountains. This one in Darling Harbour cools your feet on a hot day. The water starts at the top and spirals downward. (Click on photos for larger images.)
Part Three
My trip to Sydney
This will be my last entry about our trip to Sydney, and I’ve got a lot to fit into it, so here we go.
After arriving in the hotel we showered and relaxed a bit before heading out to Darling Harbour, which had a lot of little shops and tourist attractions. It is also the home to the Sydney Aquarium as well as many restaurants. There was a fountain there that you could walk down into, but the weather was a little too cold for that! There were also a bunch of street performers all over Sydney, many singing. But, we also saw a juggler as well as a group made up of a didgeridoo player with some Aboriginal dancers. After wandering around for a bit, we stopped in at Paddy’s Markets, which is an open-style market in Sydney. It was pretty crowded since we were there on a Friday afternoon, so we didn’t stay long; but we saw a wide array of items for sale including clothes and souvenirs as well as a large variety of fresh fruit and vegetables. Close to Perth is the town of Fremantle, which also has an example of these large markets that are a lot of fun to visit! Since we were all pretty tired at this point, we headed back to the hotel and then found a restaurant for dinner. After a filling meal, we promptly fell asleep in our hotel rooms.
 As I mentioned before, we planned on spending Saturday in Sydney Harbour. One of the great things about Sydney is that if you are fortunate enough to get a hotel close to the middle of the city, it is a relatively short walk to both Sydney and Darling Harbour—which seem to be home to the majority of Sydney attractions. So we took a walk down to Sydney Harbour and hopped on one of the Captain Cook Cruise ships. Following this we spent the rest of the day exploring the Harbour and its surrounding areas. One interesting place we found was The Rocks Market, another type of market held in Sydney. These had a lot more expensive items and not as much of the tourist-type souvenirs. I know that I could definitely have spent a lot of money there! The rest of the day at Sydney Harbour was spent at the Opera House, and I admit that this was one of my favorite parts of the trip! Although we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside the performance theaters of the Opera House, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget the grandeur of the theaters. We also learned some amazing facts about the Opera House such as the fact that the material the seats are made out of have the same sound absorbency as the human body. So, practicing in one of the theaters creates the same sound as when it is filled. The organ in the concert hall is made up of 147 pipes seen by the audience followed by more than 10,000 traveling thirty feet behind the wall! As I said last week, this pretty much ended our trip to Sydney Harbour, although we made a quick trip down to the Harbour to take pictures at night.
 Since we weren’t sure if we would be able to take part in a bridge climb or not, one of our first stops after church on Easter morning was to the visitors center to find out if any times were available. We found out that the only time available was 5:15 p.m. so we spent a little more time wandering around the area, making stops at some of the various shops in the area. Heather’s mom and grandma headed back to the hotel since they weren’t going to be climbing the bridge and Heather, Jean and I walked over to the Bridge Climb headquarters. There we heard about safety concerns, suited up and then practiced climbing the bridge on a simulation containing the main components of the bridge—ramps and ladders. After completing this, we gathered the rest of our equipment (radios and headsets) and set off to climb the bridge. The entire climb was amazing because we walked under the bridge for a while and got to see an entirely different view of the Harbour. When we started climbing it, the cars were moving by us and the view gradually got better and better. Our group, made up of twelve climbers and one leader, made our way up to the top, stopping to take a couple of pictures along the way as well as a large group picture at the very top of the bridge. While climbing, we heard a short history of the bridge as well as the area known as Sydney Harbour. Although we weren’t allowed to bring cameras with us on the trip (there was too great a chance that we would drop one on a car crossing the bridge), I have some memories that will last a lifetime. Besides abseiling, I think the bridge climb was one of my favorite parts of my trip to Australia thus far. The bridge climb completed our day, and after climbing roughly 1,400 steps, I was pretty tired.
Monday was our last day in Sydney, and it was made up of eating breakfast and packing up our suitcases for the return trip home. We took a shuttle back to the airport and boarded our plane without any incidents. The flight home was uneventful but I was glad to know that I didn’t have to get on a plane again until my flight back to the US.
Until next week,
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