Around 10am, we took the bus to Circular Quay and walked through The Rocks to get to the Bridge Climb office. It seemed like a really nice, older area that had some good shopping and old pubs. We checked in and had a snack, went through orientation, got our gear, went through simulation, and were prepped for our climb up the Sydney Harbour Bridge. We had crazy blue jumpsuits on and were attached to a wire by belay. The walk afforded breathtaking views of the harbor and how huge it is, and the climb wasn’t as difficult as we thought it would be. We had an interesting group, with mostly UK 20-somethings, but also a very pierced Canadian and an Aussie woman who said this was “something she had to do before 50”. It was a great experience, and we sent the Graces a postcard from the bridge to thank them since it was their wedding gift to us. We had a nice pasta dinner at a hotel on Circular Quay, then went back to Bondi Beach on a bus. We packed up our packs with stuff we thought we wouldn’t need until after we returned from Korea, and took a couple buses to meet Andrew at his new apartment. After a good chat with Andrew, we ran back to the station in the cold to catch the bus to Bondi.
10.4
This morning we got our stuff together, checked out by 9:45am, and stored our luggage at the hostel. It was a colder and cloudy day, but we still did the Bondi to Coogee walk, which featured great scenery. We saw some big waves crashing against the rocks, and there were a lot of other people walking about as well. We had lunch at Beach Palace Hotel where Sarah and Ted worked, and said hi to Alfio for them, but he seemed a little preoccupied with going out for his own lunch! We walked around Coogee, but were pretty freezing so we caught the bus back to Bondi Junction. We walked around a really nice, 6-level mall, Nathan got a haircut, Susan got a hair dryer, we looked at the iPod Nano, had a Baskin Robbins smoothie and milkshake, and visited the coolest Borders ever. We also found out that Australia does not sell curling irons. Susan’s does not work here and we searched through everywhere – even a Target – and had no luck. We went back to Lamrock Lodge and confirmed our shuttle, then we surfed the internet until our shuttle to the airport arrived. We flew JetStar, which is just like Southwest, with no seating assignments. We boarded an extremely noisy plane with lots of kids and a baby who cried the entire 1.5 hour flight, but we arrived fine. The baggage claim was tiny and our luggage was out really quickly and we took a shuttle to Backpackers Inn. It’s a great hostel, and we have a huge room with 4 beds. They rent out free surf boards, bikes, volleyballs, there’s a pool and also direct beach access. We can use their big kitchen and they advertise cool activities. Tonight we walked around Byron Bay town a little, and peeked in the windows of nice shops which were all closed, so we came back to the hostel.
|
