Sydney

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Managed to navigate my way from Sydney Airport to my hostel easily enough. I was staying right near the Central Station so was just a matter of getting the train so that made things straightforward! It was quite late by the time arrived and was pretty tired after the flight so didn't do all that much the first evening, just had a bit of a walk around the area was staying in. I spent my first full day in Sydney pretty much walking the whole day and trying to get a feel for the city. I followed a route suggested by the woman on the front desk at the hostel and was a nice introduction to the city as the walk down to the harbour took me though some nice parks and past some interesting buildings rather than just going through the shopping and business areas. My first views of the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House were from the distance and had absoutely lovely view, was very cool seeing them both for the first time! Felt very strange to actually be there after seeing them countless times on the television! I did spend quite a bit of time exploring the centre of the city and saw all the main shopping areas and markets, especially around chinatown but they weren't all that different from any other city, whereas down around the Harbour was pretty spectacular. I also liked the area around Darling Harbour which I thought was really cool and had nice feel to it, was surprised though by how big the area around there is as spent fair while wandering around that area.

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As I'm heading back to Sydney for a while over New Year didn't rush to cram all the sightseeing and beaches into the few days I was there so lots more to see when i go back, including going to Bondi etc. I had booked myself a flight over to Adelaide so used the last full day in Sydney to see the main sights in a bit more detail. I started off doing a tour of the Opera House, which was really interesting as didn't really know all that much about the history of it, nor really what was inside! The tour took us to 3 of the theatres and got too see some rehearsals as well which was interesting. Wasn't actually an opera on at the moment but saw rehearsals for ballet and orchestra. Once the tour finished I went over the explore the historic area of 'The Rocks' before heading back over to the Harbour for the afternoon boat cruise I'd booked. The harbour cruise lasted 2.5 hours, which was quite long but went all around the Habour area so that was really good to see bit further out that just the centre as the Harbour really is massive. The final thing I did was to walk over the Harbour Bridge and back which was really nice thing to do. When I go back I'd like to do the bridgeclimb but even walking over it is a really fab thing to do, as you get some great views of the city and of the opera house in particular.