And a Happy New Year!

The Three Sisters, Blue Mountains trip
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Next stop Sydney, for the New Year.  We actually stayed on the outskirts of Sydney, in Randwick, which was a 20 minute bus ride from Circular Quay, and was very nice.

When we got there we went for a wander round, to try to find a restaurant for dinner on NYE.  Unfortunately this wasn't going to happen as they were charging approximately $200 per person, so we decided we would play it by ear on the night.

The following day people were arriving at the Opera House at around 10am, to get the best view of the fireworks in the evening. We decided that we weren't going to waste the day doing that, so we jumped on a ferry and went to Manly, which is meant to be one of 'the' places to be seen.  We went for a wander, enjoyed the sites, then had lunch at a little Thai restaurant, with the best view ever?

Jade Carriage, Chinese Garden
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We then went for a little post-lunch 'cruise' around the harbour on another ferry, before heading back to the hotel to get ready to go out.  The buses were stopping quite a long way short of town so we had to walk a fair way, but on the way stumbled across a fantastic little Italian restaurant, which just happened to have a table for us! We had a great night in there, and at about 11pm found a little park to sit in, bought some while and whiled away the time until midnight, when we say the most spectacular fireworks I have ever seen! I am sure you have all seen them on the news and in the papers so I won't harp on, but it was amazing.

Replica of The Endeavour
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We managed to wake up reasonably early the next day, when we went off the Maritime Museum.  Rather than your regular museum, this place has a replica of Captain Cooks Endeavour, the warship HMAS Vampire, and the submarine HMAS Onlsow for you to wander around.  This was a really cool experience, which was topped off by a look around the James Craig, which has been pulled from the bottom of the ocean and fully restored.

The next day we took a (slightly more luxurious) coach trip to the Blue Mountains, which was really interesting.  We visited the Three Sisters, and took the worlds steepest train ride down into a gorge, and a cable car back up again.  The train ride was great, it cost $16 for both rides, and the train was the sort of thing you might find in a theme park!

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Rob and I spent the next day trying to find somewhere to stay in Sydney, but with no avail, so we've decided to head off to Brisbane, via Byron Bay for a few days.  Neither of us is really that keen on Sydney, I think we are just finding it too big, so we are looking forward to getting on the road.

The next day we moved out of the hotel and into a hostel for one night (it was sheer fluke and good timing that we managed to get a bed there), then visited the Chinese Gardens, which were gorgeous.  We then went and had a few drinks with Mum and Dad, before bidding them fairwell as they returned to Saudi. We had a great time with them and were very sad to see them go, but are looking forward to the next leg of our trip.