Sydney: Worth All the Fuss

The minute I set my eyes on the Opera House and Harbour Bridge from my airplane, it hit me. I was actually in Australia. No other city would have struck me this way; I would have still been living in the daze that had filled the last 2 weeks, the daze in which my mind was telling me, "All this is cool, but it can't really be happening!"Sydney is much more fast-paced than other Australian cities, like Brisbane, but this is to be expected from the largest city in Australia. Despite this, it still has the Australian vibe to it, that vibe that says, "Hey, no worries, let's go to the beach and catch some waves!"Being a big city, and one that contains quite a few well-known landmarks at that, there is plenty to do in Sydney. Of course, you have to go to the beach while you are there, and there are plenty to choose from. Unless you really want to see Bondi Beach, there are plenty of better ones to choose from: Coogee and Manly, to name a few. These are relatively easy to get to, either by taking the bus to the eastern beaches (Bondi, Coogee, etc), or the ferry to the northern beaches (Manly). The Harbour Bridge and the Opera House are obviously a must-see, and generally are the first things on everyone's to-do list. There are many ways to see both—you can view them from above from the top of the CentrePoint Tower, or from out on the harbour itself on the Manly Ferry or a harbour cruise (slightly more expensive). You can simply walk to both of them, and see the Botanic Gardens, Circular Quay, and the Rocks on the way, or see either of them up close, either by taking a tour of the Opera House ( for an adult), or by climbing the Harbour Bridge ( or more, depending on time of day and week). If you want to visit Sydney more for dining or nightlife, you won't be disappointed. Sydney offers a massive array of choices for dining, including an extensive and high quality Chinatown, and there are enough pubs and clubs to keep you busy every night you're in Sydney!Although I liked the country/laid-back attitude of Brisbane more, Sydney offers something for everyone and I still thoroughly enjoyed my visit here.

Quick Tips:

Don't just limit yourself to the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. Definitely go see them, but leave time for other activities too. Going out on the harbour is a great way to see the entire city and a beautiful harbour as well. Luna Park and the Taronga Zoo are both on the northern side of the harbour, so you can enjoy those family attractions and get a ride across the harbour all in one.I suggest seeking out parts of Sydney that aren't so paraded in guide books, like Darling Harbour, Chinatown, or some of the markets. My friends got some brilliant deals on some very good jewelry and clothing at the markets, especially Paddy's Market. These markets are open all day on the weekends and provide entertainment even if you don't want to spend anything. Sydney's Chinatown is great, and one of the best that I have ever set foot in. Darling Harbour offers plenty of nightlife, shopping, and the Sydney Aquarium, where you can go see sharks or lots of Nemos.I enjoyed just wandering around the city (with a map in hand) and seeing what it had to offer. I came across some gems in this as well—St. Mary's Cathedral, Pitts all, and Hyde Park, to name a few.So, in general, be open to exploring the many wonders that Sydney has to offer and you'll enjoy your stay even more!

Best Way To Get Around:

Sydney is a huge city, and while you can walk through parts of it, there is no way you could cover the entire city on foot (especially since there is a giant harbour dividing it in two)! Luckily, Sydney had a very good public transportation system that involved a mix of trains, ferries, and buses. Ferries were there to take people across the harbour to Taronga Zoo, Luna Park, and Manly Beach, among others, along with others that take you farther inland to areas like Parramatta. These ferries are not only a good way of transportation, but also a good way to see the sights of Sydney.There is an extensive train system throughout Sydney. Most trains can be caught at Circular Quay, which is the centre of transportation and the departing point for many ferries and buses as well. At Darling Harbour, there is a monorail that takes you in a loop between many of the main attractions.For areas that these types of transportation do not cover, there are always buses. While the buses do have the downside of getting caught in traffic, they cover more ground and can take you to outlying areas such as the eastern beaches that the trains don't reach—the train does make it to Bondi Junction, but from there you still have to catch the 380 bus to the actual beach. It's useful to have some sort of map that has major bus routes on it so you can find your way back to Circular Quay.The main choice for transportation in and out of Sydney is Kingsford-Smith Airport, which lies to the south of the city on Botany Bay. You can either catch a shuttle, taxi, or train into and out of the airport, although I've really only tried the taxi option, which can get rather expensive. The airport is serviced by most major international airlines, and by Virgin Blue, Jetstar, and Qantas domestically. It is relatively cheap to fly to Melbourne and Brisbane because of the low fares offered by Virgin Blue and Jetstar—just make sure that you take snacks on the plane and don't have much baggage at all, 20kgs tops!

The program I was using to get my visa for my third trip to Australia required me to first stop in Sydney for a (45 minute) orientation. Therefore, since I would have much preferred to already be home in Brizzy, rather than in a hostel in Sydney, it was going to take a lot for this hostel to impress me.

The service at the front desk was exceptionally quick and I had my room key and clean sheets in a minute flat. The room had been paid for by my program but the going rate for a bed in a four-bed dorm was $34, rather more than I was used to seeing in a hostel. This price could have something to do with "Sydney Central" being the name of the hostel, although I found that "central" was a rather vague term. The hostel is on George Street, which makes it easy to walk to many of the places you want to go, although it took me a good 30 minutes to get to the Sydney Opera House.

The layout of the hostel really reminded me of ACB in Auckland—probably because that’s the only other huge city backpackers I’ve stayed in. Each floor had about 30 rooms, mainly on the outer side of the hallway, while the inside had bathrooms and other facilities. My floor and two others had large TV lounges, open all the time except in the middle of the night. There was also a payphone on each floor, which really didn’t seem like many when I had to search four floors to find an open one!

The room itself was incredibly large for a hostel room. There were two sets of bunk beds and four rather large lockers (they even fit my backpack in them!) for valuables. The room was surprisingly tall as well, so there were three or four very large windows, which made the room seem airier. These had thick curtains which blocked out all the city lights at night, but unfortunately there was nothing to block out the sound. Being on George St., there was traffic noise at all hours of the night. This was the only thing I really disliked about the hostel, as it made it quite difficult for me—already sleeping light enough because of jetlag—to stay asleep for very long.

When I first walked into the bathroom, someone had torn the soap dispenser off the wall and covered the floor in pink goo. However, this was cleaned up by the next time I visited the bathroom, so it was obvious that they keep everything as clean as possible. The bathrooms were protected by a room key, so you could only use the one on your floor—good, since there was no protection in the lobby or elevators to keep people off the streets from just waltzing in.

Overall, I was impressed by this hostel, and would stay there again if I couldn’t find anything else of the same quality for a slightly lower price.

Like most other things on my third trip to Sydney, my visit to this café was completely free. The program I got my visa through—IEP—provided a voucher for a free continental breakfast (value: $6) in the Central Gourmet Café, which is attached to the Sydney Central YHA on Rawson Place at George Street.

Since I was given this breakfast for free, I can’t complain too much, but I have to say that I wouldn’t have visited this café otherwise. It seemed nice enough—it was very clean and very airy, with giant windows looking out on the traffic outside. However, the food left something to be desired. When I walked in, I got a look at the hot breakfast food they were offering. Some of it looked OK, like the bacon (which really is quite difficult to ruin), but the eggs looked very watery and barely had any color to them at all.

My breakfast consisted of a cup of tea (or coffee), a miniature glass of orange juice, a box of corn flakes, two pieces of toast, and a croissant. Since I don’t normally eat breakfast, and my stomach was still on Texas time, I felt that this would be plenty. Even this amount ended up being disappointing though. The croissant was ridiculously tough, and left me feeling that my teeth just might break if I tried to gnaw a piece off. The toast was burned, although still edible with plenty of butter and jam smeared on it. I drank the entire glass of orange juice in one gulp and the tea cup was nearly the same size.

All in all, this really left me wondering how they could validly charge $6 for so little, although I guess they do have a built-in market of tired, hungover backpackers. Perhaps their continental breakfasts are the exception and the eggs were a lot tastier than they looked behind the counter, but I wouldn’t count on it. This is located pretty much on George Street, so there are plenty of other options that I would advise trying before stopping here, at least for breakfast.

Once I reached Circular Quay on my first trip into Inner Sydney, I decided to take a trip out to Manly Beach on the Manly Ferry. This was not only so I could see a beach I had heard was extremely nice, but also so I could see the harbour itself and the world-renowned landmarks it contained. And for $12 ($6 for a concession ticket), this ride is one of the best deals you can find in Sydney.

I only had to wait about 10 minutes for the ferry to leave. No one ever has to wait exceptionally long--the ferry departs every 30 minutes, and if you just miss one, you can always take a walk to the Opera House and be back in time for the next ferry.

The view from the ferry is spectacular as soon as it sets off. I felt torn on which way to look. In one direction, the city was shrinking behind me—the closest skyscraper of all was the one the helicopter crashed into in the original Matrix. In another direction, the architectural wonder of the Opera House slowly slinked by. In a third direction, the giant metal coat hanger spanning the harbour, also known as the Harbour Bridge, was getting ever larger. Luckily, I was sitting on the back deck of the ferry, which was open, so I could sit in one place (luckily there weren't too many people milling about this early on a weekday morning) and turn my camera to get as many snaps as possible.

The views didn't become any less amazing throughout the ride, which took at most 20 minutes from Circular Quay to Manly Wharf. As soon as we moved a little farther away from Circular Quay, we could see a sweeping panorama of the city, the Opera House, the Bridge, and Luna Park. It really was a lot to take in, and it was such a beautiful, nearly cloudless day that everything just gleamed. I couldn't have asked for anything better than to be standing at the back of the ferry, taking in the deep blue of the harbour, the sky blue above me, and everything in between.

Even as we moved towards Manly and the city and landmarks weren't visible anymore, the views kept me transfixed. Homes sat on hills around the harbour, waves beat against tiny cliffs. There was plenty of smaller traffic in the harbour as well, and a few of the fisherman/sailors/day-trippers waved at the children frantically waving at them from beside me. I tried to see Bondi, since I knew it was just over a hill, but I never did get a glimpse of it.

This trip offers all the views of a harbour cruise, and it operates all day, so you can choose to see the harbour in brilliant sunlight, at twilight, or at night, (or maybe all three if you keep going back and forth!). This is an absolutely brilliant way to see plenty of Sydney in a very short time!

For the final segment of our study abroad orientation, we were sent on an evening harbour cruise. I'm not sure how much it cost, or even what company it was with since it was included as part of our orientation. I do know that it left from Darling Harbour just before sunset along with quite a few other cruise boats; I also know that it must have been fairly expensive because we were served a few courses along with champagne.Since we left Darling Harbour just before sunset, we had just enough time to cruise underneath the Harbour Bridge (by this point, I think I had seen pretty much every angle of that bridge possible, yet it still left me awestruck every time I saw it) before the sun went down. We were able to get some pretty good shots of the Opera House and the Bridge with the sun setting behind them from the top deck of the cruise ship, which was totally open and had a few benches lining it for enjoying the view. It was pretty interesting attempting to sit or stand in one place, however, since the wind had kicked up and we were moving at a pretty fair clip.After we had taken enough pictures, we moved down to an area where we could actually hear each other—the main cabin. This was entirely filled with dining tables. We couldn't see a whole lot out of the relatively small windows, though, so whenever we wanted to take in the sights again we generally just moved back to the roof.The dinner was not spectacular, but it was reasonable. They gave us a choice between chicken and a vegetarian option, so there was at least something for everyone. I'm not one that generally likes to eat on-board anything, due to my severe motion sickness, but the boat was level enough that I didn't feel that bad for the entire cruise. We were also provided with champagne, but only one glass full (I think this was a very good thing, since the boat was filled with 20-year-old students); this was the only drink they provided, although they did bring me water when I asked.We were on the harbour for at least a few hours, until it was completely dark and Sydney had taken on a whole new, brightly lit character. We circled around in the outer harbour, while still in view of central Sydney, and eventually started back towards Darling Harbour. It seemed that the minute we turned, fireworks went off over the Opera House. No one had a clue what was being celebrated—maybe a wedding, maybe Chinese New Year?—but it was amazing to see this, especially since I've always wanted to go to New Year's in Sydney.Overall, I enjoyed the cruise, but I don't think I would have taken it if it were not provided by our orientation; the sights are the same as on the Manly Ferry, which is much cheaper!

As soon as I got off the ferry and began wandering through the Manly area, I was instantly a much bigger fan than I ever was of Bondi. Manly's main street, The Corso, was a cute, artistic street lined with shops, rather than a gaudy, insanely touristy street lined with shops like Campbell Parade. There was plenty of greenery in the form of tiny gardens and palm trees planted along the street, and I saw a couple (rather different) sculptures that spiced up the decor of the area. The shops themselves did not seem nearly as touristy (or maybe that could just be my bias against Bondi)—I saw plenty of the tacky souvenirs, but was also able to find some very nice looking ones as well, along with some great postcards.An interesting factoid about Manly Beach: apparently, when Captain Cook made his first visit to Australia, there was an Aboriginal man standing on the Manly peninsula looking out at them. Someone made a comment along the lines of "He looks very manly", and the name stuck.The Corso takes you straight across the tiny peninsula that Manly is located on from Manly Wharf, on the harbour side and where the ferry docks, to Manly Beach itself. I liked that The Corso was perpendicular to Manly Beach, rather than parallel, because it separated the shopping and eating area from the actual beach area. So, instead of the beach being lined with shops, it was lined with plenty of pine trees and a few hotels and other buildings peeking out between them.The view here is absolutely, well, breathtaking. The beach stretches much farther than Bondi does, and it seems that everywhere you look, there is white sand, brilliant blue waves, or the deep green of the pine trees waiting to greet you. The beach could have been as crowded as Bondi, but since it was much longer, the density of people was much lower.While I didn't go swimming, because of my inability to actually remember to put my swimsuit in my bag, I did dip my feet in the water. It was a bit cold, but the type of cold that you get used to and feel refreshed by after a few dunks in the waves, rather than the bone-chilling kind of say, the beach at Apollo Bay on the Great Ocean Road in the middle of the winter. The waves here are said to be some of the best in the area for surfing as well, so there were surfers out en force. You don't have to worry too much about getting hit by a surfer if you're just swimming, which was one of my main concerns at a beach like Byron Bay, because there are flags marking the swimmers' area and flags marking the surfers' area.Manly Beach was, overall, fantastic. I just wish I had more time there—next time, if I'm staying on a beach in Sydney, it will most certainly be at Manly!

When I arrived in Sydney, I had only one pre-booked activity the Sydney Harbour BridgeClimb. I was very excited about doing this, and whenever anybody before my trip asked me what I was planning on doing, this was inevitably the first thing out of my mouth. It was definitely rather damaging to my pocketbook—$165 for a daylight climb on a weekday—and I went at the cheapest time possible! Rates can get up to a ridiculous $245 for a twilight climb on a weekend. At this price, I expected it to be nothing less than extraordinary.I arrived at the BridgeClimb center—located at 5 Cumberland Street in The Rocks—around 30 minutes before my scheduled climb. The absolute latest that climbers can arrive is 15 minutes before their scheduled climb time, so they can begin the pre-climb preparations. To wile away the time, I looked at the wall of photos of the many celebrities that had done the climb, from Pat Rafter to Matt Damon to the entire Australian rugby team.When they finally called our group, we went through a whirlwind of preparations. First, we had an alcohol breath test to make sure we were completely sober; any alcohol on our breath and we were gone. Then we had to fill out waivers and put on BridgeClimb gear (including the wonderful gray jumpsuit). Everything had to be attached to our body—glasses and hats both had straps that were attached to the keyring at the back of our suit. This was all to make sure that none of our gear fell onto traffic below and caused accidents, which was a reasonable concern. However, they used this as an excuse to tell us we were not allowed to take cameras at all, regardless of whether they had straps on them or not. I thought this was a little ridiculous—we're climbing the Sydney Harbour Bridge, of course we'd want to take pictures, and if the camera is securely attached to us, why not? Of course, the reason why not was because they took our pictures for us, and then sold them to us for up to $30 a pop at the end.Once we were all ready to go, we got to go on the "BridgeClimb simulation". This was pretty much five or six stairs, a long, narrow walkway, and then stairs back down. Our guide showed us here exactly how we were to go up and down the stairs and how we were to attach to the bridge. We did this by taking our belt and running it onto the wire running alongside the walkway. This part was pretty boring but necessary; however, we spent way too long here because we had to wait for all the previous groups to move on before we could. This wait time did help in letting us all get to know each other, since up on a fake bridge we couldn't do much else.This review is continued in BridgeClimb, pt 2.

This is a continuation of my BridgeClimb review.After we finally got off the fake bridge, we got our helmets and headsets, through which our tour guide would talk to us. This completed our fashionable gear and we were ready to go.The climb itself was interesting, but not particularly strenuous. All we really had to do was climb up and down a bunch of stairs, and be able to walk up a fair distance above the water without getting too afraid of heights. It wasn't quite as exciting as I had envisioned, although the view was indeed wonderful.The climb path went along the road until we reached the bridge, and then along the ground level of the bridge until we reached a set of ladders. These ladders took us up to the top of the arch closest to the Opera House, and from there we walked up stairs that became increasingly shallower as we got closer to the top. When we reached the highest point of the bridge, we stopped and had our pictures taken, and then crossed over to the other arch and began the climb down. Going down the ladders on that side of the bridge was especially exciting because at any point a train could fly by and scare you off them!My climb was at 4:45pm, which was one of the last climbs before the special "twilight" rates. While we didn't actually get to see any of the sunset, the city still looked amazing. Looking towards the west was a bit of a problem, however, since we just stared straight into the sun. It was nice to get the views of the Opera House, but looking back on it, I probably could have chosen a better time where I could see 360 degree views, rather than be blinded for 180 of those degrees.The tour guide was very good and had obviously been doing the climb for a very long time. He told us a lot of interesting tidbits about the bridge and its construction. Apparently the bridge is the largest and widest single-arch bridge in the world, but not the longest (losing out to America's Bayonne Bridge). The pylons at either end of the bridge actually have no value for holding up the bridge itself, and are really just there to make it more visually attractive. He also told us some pretty scary stories about how construction was carried out when the bridge was built in the 30s!This was a fun trip, but I didn't feel that it was worth the exorbitant price. The pictures were a ripoff as well at $30 for four, but you feel obligated to buy them because you've already spent so much on the climb itself, why not have some memories? Both the CentrePoint Tower and helicopter rides offer better views (because they include the Bridge as well), are cheaper, and allow you to take a camera along, so I would recommend these instead.

Darling Harbour is a hugely popular recreational area for Sydneysiders and tourists alike. I wandered through this area nearly by accident; I knew I was getting close to the Darling area once I found Chinatown, but it was quite a surprise when I actually found myself there.

While the actual area around the harbour is not exceptionally beautiful, being built up around concrete wharves, the first part of Darling that I wandered through was rather green and nice on the eyes. I saw the Chinese Gardens and a nice little (very man-made) stream, along with a nice little inlet that ran up to the visitor centre.

The visitors centre was absolutely huge and offered plenty of information for anyone in need, although I didn't stay too long because my goal of the day was to see wherever Sydney took me. Once I got past the visitors centre, the harbour opened up around me. It definitely had plenty to do—there was a huge shopping centre on one side and plenty of restaurants and pubs along the other. There were lots of large boats docked in the harbour itself.

Along with the shopping and dining, Darling Harbour also offers an IMAX theatre and the Sydney Aquarium, advertised on the outside with (what else?) but lots of Nemo pictures. I didn't actually go in, but my friend that did told me that there were huge tanks of the kind that completely surround the walkway, full of sharks. There's also plenty of children's play areas, and although I didn't see many around since it was a weekday and a school day, I'm sure the place is swarming with children on weekends during the day; however, once it gets dark the average age gets much higher.

I enjoyed hopping through a few of the bars on the night after our harbour cruise, although they were fairly packed, and we found that unless you stood in the outside area of the Cargo bar, you inhaled lungfuls of smoke instead of air.

Getting to Darling Harbour is very easy. I found that it wasn't a particularly long walk from the CBD, and there is also a monorail that runs in a circle from the CBD to Darling Harbour.

Darling Harbour definitely offers something for people of all ages. While it's not the most (really, quite far from it) picturesque part of Sydney, it offers plenty of entertainment and even more places to spend your money—like you need any more of those in this city!

For the three hours between the end of my orientation and my flight out of Sydney, I really wanted to go up CentrePoint tower and get a look at the city from above, so I could compare it to what I saw from the Harbour Bridge. However, the weather didn’t agree with those plans—the day was drizzly with incredibly low-hanging clouds—but luckily, the free voucher I received from orientation could be used at the Sydney Aquarium as well, so to the Aquarium I went.

The Aquarium was surprisingly packed for a Monday morning, although I guess it was understandable since the majority of the children looked well below school age. The line to buy a ticket stretched nearly to the door, but I luckily got to bypass this, already having a voucher. All I had to do was walk up and get my hand stamped, indicating that I could come in and out for the rest of the day, and walk on in.

Some of the Aquarium was pretty typical—animals that you would see at most aquariums, like seals and catfish. However, there were plenty of Australian wildlife to see, including the platypus (platypi?) tank. There were a couple platypuses swimming frenetically around the tank, never staying more than a second anywhere. They really are bizarre creatures. I stood a while and watched; I was really happy to see it since it was the only Australian animal I had missed on my previous trips out.

There were plenty of interesting, less heard of Australian animals, like the Australian long-necked turtle and the Port Jackson shark, in the many aquariums following the platypuses. I also saw a lot of fluorescent coral and some jellyfish that glowed a really bright red. There was a whole section on the Great Barrier Reef at the end with more coral and reef wildlife, including plenty of Dorys and a couple (although not many) Nemos to keep the children screaming.

My favorite part of the Aquarium was the Oceanarium, where you literally walk through a huge tank full of ocean wildlife. You are surrounded on all sides, except the bottom, by the tank, which makes it pretty interesting when a 3m long shark is swimming above you! Definitely makes you happy that there is a large sheet of glass between you and those giant teeth. I spent a lot of time here, sitting on the railing and watching the different animals swim over and around me. Besides sharks, there were enormous string rays and sea turtles (just waiting to give you a high-5 and say "You have serious thrill issues, dude!). There was a smaller Reef Oceanarium later on, where you could see water below your feet as well, but wasn’t nearly up to the level of the original Oceanarium.

Overall, I thought this was a good way to pass the time, although I’m not sure if I would have paid the $27 to visit if I hadn’t had the voucher.

The Opera House is always the first or second item on a first-time visitor to Sydney’s to-see list, only beaten out by the Harbour Bridge. The Opera House, located on Bennelong Point and bordered on one side by the Royal Botanic Gardens and the other by Circular Quay, was designed by a little-known Danish architect, Jorn Utzon, in 1955 but wasn’t opened until 1973. In between, there was plenty of bickering and budget changes that continually delayed construction. The most famous disagreement that occurred on this project happened between a minister set to supervise the project and the architect himself, which led him to leave the country and not see his most famous piece of work until the 1990s!

The question that stuck in my head when I wanted to visit the Opera House was: how? I had already seen it from the sky, albeit from very high up where it only appeared to be a large reflector, but should I walk up to it (and from which direction? From Circular Quay or the Botanic Gardens), or should I see it from on the Harbour, or in the air (from the CentrePoint Tower? From the Harbour Bridge? From a helicopter?). I ended up snapping it from the ferry, and then walking at it from Circular Quay, and then from the Harbour Bridge…and then from walking at it from the Botanic Gardens, and then from a harbour cruise, and then looking across the water at it from the Rocks. From every angle, it looks different and simply amazing. No wonder it is so famous and used in nearly every image you ever see advertising the city or even the country (to use Jon Stewart’s words: "Here’s the obligatory picture of the Sydney Opera House"). Not only that, but it has completely different character depending on whether you view it during the day, at sunset, or at night. And, if you’re lucky, you’ll get to see fireworks reflecting off the roof like we did!

Even on my third visit to Sydney, I was still fascinated by the Opera House. It just strikes you every time with its tiles dancing in the sun, blinding you with their stark contrast to the jet black bridge behind it and the blue of the harbour water. I didn’t get a chance to go on a tour, which was only about $20 if you don’t go backstage, but I was happy simply to walk to it and take in the (slightly stormy) moment. In my first trip, I enjoyed just sitting on the steps, watching the ferries go by and the tiny climbers making their way to the top of the Harbour Bridge. This time, I found that sitting opposite the House on the Rocks side of Circular Quay was just as enjoyable, looking across at the world-renowned landmark and just soaking in the fact that I was indeed back in the beautiful Land Down Under.