Sydney

So after a nice little 2 night stopover in Dubai we’re finally here ready to start our adventures in Australia, New Zealand and the Cook islands.

I’m not sure we would do Dubai again to be honest. It’s got no atmosphere, no identity, just a sprawling concrete jungle with man made beaches, and very expensive. The roads are crazily busy, took 90 minutes to get back to the airport, just a 20 mile drive. I think the place has outgrown itself. The only thing going for it is the weather.

Got to Sydney after a 14 hour flight, which was excellent due to the fact that the plane was only half full, so we were both able to spread out and lay down to get some sleep. Navigated the trains easily to get to our airbnb in the northern Sydney suburbs. Here are a few snaps of Dubai.

So day 1 in Sydney was quite stressful. Had to find the place to get our car which wasn’t too bad, just a couple of train trips and a 1 mile walk. There was quite a bit of admin to get through which was a bit difficult to follow in our jetlagged state. Then my airalo app which I installed before we left in order to get an eSIM for Australia didn’t work, so we had to purchase a local SIM instead. That took longer than we thought it would take.

We also had to then drive to an office to register our vehicle as the new owners, which meant driving in a busy suburb of Sydney city in an unfamiliar car with automatic transition, which I’m not familiar with. We then had to get the car back to our airbnb accommodation, which was about an hour away, and the traffic was crazy busy, and it was pissing down! We definitely enjoyed a few drinks that night when it was all over.

Day 2 in Sydney was somewhat better. After a trip to the supermarket to get some food, which wasn’t that straight forward we then got a train into the city to go on a city guided walking tour in the afternoon. The weather was cloudy and a bit rainy still, but the tour was very good and our guide Steve was quite entertaining. Learned quite a bit about the history of Sydney, and the indigenous aboriginal people.

Day 3 in Sydney saw the sun come out for a while, which was nice. We headed out to a place called Coogee, a coastal suburb and from there took a clifftop coastal walk to Bondi, together with an Australian friend Liz Vaughan who also owns a flat in England in the same block as my mum. A fantastic scenic walk which took about 2 hours. A really worthwhile thing to do, fantastic seeing the aussies enjoying a warm afternoon on their beaches. They do know how to enjoy themselves, very natural in their own environment (sounds like I’m talking about a species of animal). After we got to Bondi, after enjoying a couple of lovely cold beers at the Bondi iceberg, storm clouds rolled in and we got absolutely soaked, see the video below which gives a little insight into how dramatic the thunderstorm was.

Day 4 in Sydney was a cracker with blue skies and warm sunshine so we headed off on the bus to Manly. Bus ride was about 40 minutes but quite enjoyable. Manly is a nice town and the beach is fantastic. Great wide beach with surf waves right along it, and very pleasing on the eye.

However if you are looking for a calmer beach to swim in then head to the right hand side of the beach and follow the walkway to Shelleys beach, about 10 minutes from Manly. There is a nice strip of sand to lay your towel down, perfect water for swimming, plus good for snorkelling. There is also a really good beach side cafe/restaurant called the Boathouse for drinks and food. Take a look at this sample of images and videos from our day.