Aspen Hotel Ultimo Sydney

... so we don’t have to swim across the path of the tenders. The rocks are razor sharp and even sitting on the flippers doesn’t help a lot when putting on the Lycra suits. Dianne manages to leave a piece off the backside of her suit on the rocks. The water is pretty cold, but not bitter, so we are able to stay in a long while, even swimming out to an isolated ...

Today we walked to Circular Quay, the Sydney Opera House, Royal Botanic Gardens, and on to Mrs. Macquarie's Chair (a rock outcrop with a panoramic view of Sydney Harbour). The harbour was bustling with activity with lots of school trips touring the Opera House and family picnics in the gardens. It was a beautiful warm day (high 70s) and the Botanic Gardens were stunning. You can see many of the ...

... bunk beds, ha, ha! We decide to head to Manley the next day which is a ferry ride from central quay, at breakfast over my raisin toast, my face drops and a scream of devastation as I realise I no longer have my panasonic camera of dreams, can you imagine my despair, only 2000 memories captured! Thank god Andrea helped me track where it was at the internet cafe still had it, 'what are you doing going home in 2 days Andrea' I can't do this on my own!! Anyway after that drama ...

... site reminded me a lot of Manhattan Beach. At the beach we watched surfers wipe out as we ate our lunch and did reading for class. All in all, the day was a success.<br><br>Week of August 3rd<br>The following weekend we walked down to Darling Harbour and visited the Aquarium in honor of my roommates birthday. Like all of Sydney, Darling Harbour was simply radiant. I'm pretty sure the water glistens brighter here than anywhere else because of the hole in ...

... t find a doorbell. They give a number for night manager, call and no one is answering, then my signal goes out. Fabulous. Finally I see a guy walk by and get him to let me in, and points me toward the manager so I can get my room key. Get up to my room at 11, it took 4 hours to get here, and just crashed. <br><br>Never stayed in a hostel before so was quite the experience, and not so bad as I thought. It was a girls only room, only 4 of us so thats not too bad. Roommates were nice.

we're here!! we finally made it :) afetr sitting in the same spot for 14 and a half hours haha that was definitely not something i want to do again - but unfortunately will have too lol<br><br>so pretty much our flight out of LA was delayed but luckily only by 20 mins - we ended up leaving at 11:00pm on Wednesday and got to Sydney this morning at 6:00am (Friday) - coolest part of the whole flight was that our plane was one of the new doubledecker planes :) it was massive ...

Today was an exhausting day involving the animals of Taronga Zoo. Apparently one of the best zoos in the world, Taronga Zoo plays host to many different species. Thankfully, they recognised Edinburgh as a uni so I got student discount from the otherwise semi-extortionate rate...<br><br>I was quite excited to see kangaroos which were my definite highlight as we were able to go into an enclosure where kangaroos, wallabies, and an emu were just roaming free. The best thing was seeing ...

... and I met some great people who I spent the next couple of days with. Like every other tourist I must have taken hundreds of photos of the opera house and harbour bridge from every angle possible, but you can't deny how impressive they are. I visited the aquarium, zoo, botanic gardens, went up the sky tower where I watched the sunset, and spent time walking around The Rocks, which is the oldest part of the city with lots of little historical streets and ...

Well back home now. Memories are starting to fade already, must make a mental note to start to organise the next trip back to this part of the world. 1. Highlight of the trip, if I am only allowed to choose on, sitting in a penguin rookery surounded by Adelie Penguins and looking out over the the amazing lanscape of the Antarctic mountains and a sea of Icebergs. 2. Lowlight of the trip, coming home knowing that it is all ...

... place.<br><br>Things I noticed right away were the differences in spelling, like "harbour" vs "harbor" or 'centre" vs "center." And words like the "lift" for elevator, "holiday" for vacation, things like that. Also I guess in Australia what our high school is they call college. So I would explain to people that I finished two years of college while I was in high school, now that I look back on that I'm sure they didn't understand!<br><br>I spent a day at surf ...