A Very 'Manly' Beach
Trip Start
Oct 04, 2004
1
59
102
Trip End
Ongoing
Sydney,
Australia
Monday, January 3, 2005
Kate, being the one only one with brains, hadn't left anything in the car, but James, not being the smartest of people of people (well he is in the army!) decided to leave his bag in there. Deciding that it would be a much safer option for his:
Laptop
Ipod
Passport
Flight ticket
96 (Full) DVD case including his prized collection of porn
Digital Camera
than locking it in either a locker, or even easier, our room
01. The Opera House from the Manly Beach Ferry
!To make it worse, he wasn't with us at the time, instead in a random girl's bedroom getting undressed, so we took great pleasure phoning him to tell him the bad news!
He ended up sitting in the Police Station for 4 hours filling out forms and giving descriptions of everything, whilst we waited in the car around the corner. I have to give credit to another would be thief that started to rummage through the boot, oblivious to the fact we were actually in the car! I've never seen someone run as fast, when I jumped out the car and shouted Oi!
Fortunately, Holly and Dan found his bag dumped in an alleyway, although empty, they had left his passport and flight tickets. At least he could get home. Thank goodness for travel insurance! Sadly I forgot to take a photo of the car though so you could see the damage!
The rest of our time in Sydney was spent mostly frequenting bars and sight seeing. We visited another couple of beaches, the famous Bondi, which although crammed to the brim with English Backpackers, wasn't as bad as everyone makes out, and Manly Beach, which we had to catch a ferry to get to
02. From the Side
. Although a very nice beach, less crowded and bigger, I did lose my watch in the surf, which was a bit annoying, as it left me with a very big, obvious sun tan mark!We spent Wednesday climbing the great Sydney Harbour Bridge. Holly had generously bought us the trip for Christmas, so we had been eager to use the voucher for some time.
Once the talks, video's, more talks, training and the mandatory breath test was done, we got suited up, and followed our leader up the massive structure.
We all enjoyed the climb, though very windy, we did get some amazing views of the surrounding area. Our only grumble was that it wasn't particularly good value for money, especially as you can enter one of the Bridge's concrete pillars for a fraction of the price, and take you camera up it, something forbidden on the climb. They charge more to climb the bridge on January as its peak season. We didn't pay as it was a present, so it didn't really bother us, but James did, so it hit his wallet hard. When you think they run climbs 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, you can imagine how much money they must make!
We ended our fun packed week in Sydney by having a leaving do for Dave. He was due to leave the next morning on the Oz Experience bus. What was planned as a quiet farewell, quickly led to a night of alcohol fuelled madness, leading to us all getting to bed at 6am. Needless to say, Dave missed his bus.
But what about us? Well after saying goodbye to James and the others off the Kiwi Bus, we headed for the station to catch a train to Melbourne. We didn't know it then, but Melbourne would be our home for the next 4 months...
