Almost as soon as I started planning my itinerary for an Australian trip, I realized that trying to fit all the things I want to see into 10 days would be very difficult, even if all I want is to hit the key east coast spots such as Sydney, Gold Coast, Melbourne, and Cairns (Great Barrier Reef).  After discussing options with Jessica, who was going with me on the trip, we finally decided to just keep our visit to the Sydney and Brisbane/Gold Coast area so that we do don’t end up spending all our time in transit.   Our plan itinerary ended up being: First three days in Sydney, then to Brisbane/Gold coast for four days, and then back to Sydney for two days before heading back home. This was to be my first trip to any where south of the equator.

We arrived into Sydney early in the morning and couldn’t have asked for a better weather backdrop.  It felt real good to see clear blue sky and brilliant sunshine after more than a week of being under a hazy sky in China.  It was warm on this early October spring day (have to remember to turn everything upside down here in the southern hemisphere).  Our initial stay in Sydney turned out to be warmer than typical.  In some ways, it reminded me of an early spring day in California.

We took a taxi to our hotel.  With October 1st being Labor Day in New South Wales, the streets was fairly quiet when we drove into town.  We stayed at the Holiday Inn near Darling Harbor and Chinatown area.  It’s always a crapshoot when you select a hotel in an area that you are not familiar, but the location turned out quite fortuitous, as it was located close most of the key attractions in the city.   On that first day, we met up with my cousin who lived in the Sydney area.  He brought along his nine-year old son, and we made trek to the nearby Blue Mountain national park area, as that is some place more difficult to go on our own.

Not unlike driving out from the Bay Area to Yosemite or the Sierras, the scene becomes more pastoral once we drove out beyond the city and suburbs.  Near the Blue Mountain area, we could see cows and sheep roaming the ranges.  The Blue Mountains has various look-out points for people to take in its spectacular scenery.  Echo Point is one of the most popular spot, which showcased a rock formation called the Three Sisters, with three vertical rocks that resemble three sisters, along with a view of the Gibraltar Range, which is a wide flat top mountain range.  We spend some time walking around the trails there a bit.  While walking down toward the Three Sisters, we were almost blown off to the valley floor below when we encountered several strong gust of wind.  At one point, everyone heading down the steps just kind of stopped and huddled together to wait for the wind gust to die down.

Next, we went over to another part of the park area called Scenic World which has the world’s steepest railway; a cable rail track that once was used in the 1800s to pull materials from the mines.   The railway takes people down to a spot about halfway to the valley floor. To help to protect the land, a wooden platform is built where visitors can walk and see a rainforest environment area without ‘disturbing’ anything.  We took one of the shorter trails, but were still able to see quite a bit of the native plants and trees.

After grabbing some quick chicken and chips to eat in the car, we drove about an hour plus to the Jenolan Caves Park, which required us to drive some of the narrowest mountain roads that I have ever been on, where in some places only a single car can pass through.  There are four or five caves in the Park; the one we toured was the Lucas Cave, which is the largest of the caves.  This was the first big ‘cave’ that I have ever went into, and it was truly amazing seeing all the stalactites, stalagmites and other things that showcased how thousand of years of nature’s forces help to carve out all the wonderful formations.  The caves is said to have a constant 58 degree F temperature year round inside.

For dinner that night, we went to a Chinese seafood restaurant in the southern part of the Sydney with the rest of my cousin’s family.  My cousin said that one of the things I would notice is that no matter where you go in Australia, there would be a Chinese restaurant somewhere.  Nonetheless, for good ones, you still need to be picky.  And this restaurant was fairly good.  (One other thing that I noticed during my short stay is that Cantonese is fairly widely used by the local Chinese in the city, more so than mandarin.)

It was a fairly long day given we got off the plane in the morning from the overnight flight, but without having to endure the ‘time’ lag effect, it wasn’t too bad.  And the sleep that night was good as well.  (It wasn’t until I woke up in the morning did I realize that a monorail pass by about only 15 feet right in front our room window.  While the train was fairly quiet, it was still a strange sight.)

The next day, we decided to take things a bit slower and plan to just walk around the city and to over to the beaches at Manly.  We first walked through Darling Harbor area, in some ways a reconnaissance to figure out what things we want to see in more details later on.  This is where the Maritime Museum, the Aquarium, iMax theaters, etc were located.  This is also an area lined with restaurants off the both sides of the horseshoe shape harbor area.

From Darling Harbour, we walked toward the center of the city.  While this area is not unlike many other metropolitan cities, Sydney does have its own charms, architecture and style.  In terms of culture, I would say Australia feels a bit more European than American.  Nonetheless, Australians definitely has their own style that is distinct.  For sports, rugby rules down here (though it was unfortunate that while I was there, the Aussies got knocked out of the Rugby World Cup, by England no less.)   There are enough ‘local’ sports here that US Sports doesn’t get much coverage in the local papers.

The city center has some beautiful Victorian era buildings mixed in with the new buildings.  There are office buildings intermix with shopping arcades, and as I later found out, lots of linkage of buildings beneath the ground and via sky bridges.

We walked northward toward the ferry terminals at Circular Quay for our trip to Manly.  There are six ferry terminals there, each with regular scheduled ships/boats going to various destinations within the greater Sydney Harbor area.  In addition, there are smaller charter boats and taxis prying their trade along the side of the terminals.  I really didn’t realize how much of a “water town” Sydney is until I got here.  The layout of the harbor and the bay naturally leads to the utilization of the waterways as the one of the key means of transportation.  The number of people using these ferries is still strong.  The ferry that we took to Manly can hold over 1,000 people and runs every half hour or so.  We got in early enough in the queue to get a seat on the outside deck at the stern.   From this vantage point on the ferry, we were able to get some great pictures of the Opera House, Harbor, the Bridge, and the city itself, as we sail away from the city towards Manly, located on the northeastern side of the harbor. Just to the south of Manly is the Sydney Harbour National Park, whose southern tip forms the North Head entrance to the harbor from Tasman Sea (Sydney’s city center lies on the south side of the harbor).   There are shorelines on two sides of Manly, the bay side where the ferry landed and the sea side, where Manly Beach is located.

Upon arriving in Manly, we first went to the Manly Beach area (which is only about a quarter mile from the ferry terminal) and picked out a café restaurant with outside seating and a view of the beach for lunch.  That turned out to be a key MO for us during this trip:  Picking restaurants with alfresco dinning as much as possible.  We then took a walk along the beach, just kind of taking in the view and fresh air, taking pictures, and some people watching.  We then walked and browsed through the shops that lined the streets connecting the two waterfronts. This was one of the ‘between term’ school breaks for many schools there; therefore, we saw quite a number of teenagers huddle about the beaches, with many of them very shy about wearing the bare minimum even while walking around the town and shops.

After looking through the shops, we then head over to the beaches on the bay side nearby the ferry terminals for a stroll.  The interesting thing was seeing the contrast in waves between the two sides: with surfable waves on the sea side and baby calm water on the bay side.  There was also a section off the beach here where a net was wrapped around it.  Guess it is to protect the swimmers from certain marine visitors that may wander into the bay.

When we took the ferry back to Sydney, we stopped for some ice cream at Circular Quay area next to the Sydney Opera House.  After hanging around there for a while, doing nothing but just people watching and soaking in the sun, we headed south to Hyde Park as the sun starts to set.  We sat at a bench there for a while and discussed the options we have before dinner.  Jessica was intrigued by the David Jones department store that features six stories devoted all to women’s clothing.  But I was able to talk her into going to the Sydney Tower, the 260 meter tall tower in the middle of town that offers a 360 degree view of the city (similar to the Space Needle).  The vantage point of the tower does offer one with a great view of the greater Sydney area.  While the night view wasn’t bad, it was hard to take pictures.  In addition to the observation deck, another part of the ‘ride’ at Sydney Tower is a disneyesque animatronic type of show and a simulation ride that provides a highlight of what Australia has to offer.

After the Tower visit we went to a Japanese restaurant in the city that we had seen earlier that day on the way back to the Darling Harbor area.  It was during dinner that I got the message from my cousin that he was able to book a tour to Port Stephens (for dolphin watching) the next day for us.   As we had to get up early the next day for that tour, we decided head back to the hotel early instead of going to the Star City Casino or shopping.

Port Stephens is about a two-hour plus drive north from downtown Sydney, just beyond Newcastle on the coast.  As part of the tour, we also stopped at the Australian Reptile Park (in Somersby, about 45 minutes away from Sydney), a winery and a visit to the Stockton Sand Dunes on Anna Bay, said to be the longest stretch of sand dunes in the Southern Hemisphere.

The Australian Reptile Park is probably a bit of misnomer these days.  In addition to snakes, crocs and lizards, there are koalas, wallabies, dingoes, kangaroos and even a spider exhibit.   The best part of the walk through the park was the up close view of one of the koalas (holding and cuddling koalas is prohibited in New South Wales) and the feeding of the kangaroos.  The funniest part of the visit occurred when Jessica was feeding one of the kangaroos.  While she turned away briefly, it dove nose first into the bag of popcorn she was holding and tried to take the whole bag.

The ride from the Reptile Park to Port Stephens on the Sydney Newcastle freeway was rather pedestrian.  And we fell asleep most of the way.  When we got near the winery, we noticed there was a lot of smoke.  We didn’t take notice at the time, but it would turn out to have an impact our return journey that evening.  The winery we visited was a small local one that only sell their wines onsite.  Having been to many wineries in Napa and Sonoma, the one striking thing for me at this winery is the dry, parch feel to the landscape even though the climate probably is not too different.

After the winery visit, we head to Nelson Bay at Port Stephens to board our dolphin-watching cruise.  The boat was a nice two-level yacht.  We picked out a seat on the top level.  For lunch, the bus driver brought a bag of seafood and chips for everyone.  (Fish and Chips is a fairly popular over there, but this turned out to be the only time I had anything resemble Fish and Chips on this trip.)  In the beginning, it was a struggle to catch the sight of a dolphin.  But finally, we did see several.  During one stretch, we had several that swam very close to the boat and around it. However, the dolphins dove in and out of the water so quickly that it was hard to take pictures.  (None quite stick their head out of the water for extended period like those in the movies and shows.)  Still, it was an interesting experience for us.

After the cruise, we went to the sand dunes at Anna Bay, which was a short hop away.  The one interesting sight at the dunes was a camel ride, with three camels.   Didn’t know camels were indigenous in Australia. (They are actually imported, but supposedly there are over 700,000 in central Australia today.)  The highlight of the sand dune visit was taking everyone to an area to “sand board” down a dune. This is basically sitting on a board sliding down the sand dune.  While it looked like a fairly steep 45 degree plus downhill, it wasn’t too bad going down.  The key was try to stay back on the board when you ride it. On one of my rides, I leaned forward a bit too much and almost toppled over when I reached the bottom.  The hard part was walking back uphill in the sand and then getting out all the sands out from our cloth afterwards.

On the way back to Sydney, we stopped at a rest stop for fuel and bathroom break about an hour and a half outside of Sydney.  However, it was there that we learned all the roads back to Sydney has been closed due to a nearby fire, and they don’t know when the roads will be open again.  Initially, I didn’t think much of it, but after hearing people talk that the roads may not open until the morning, I start to worry about missing our flight to Brisbane the next morning, and not having any information with me to rebook anything even if I had to.

Everyone just kind of sat around, grabbed a bit to eat not knowing when we may eat again, and trying to figure out options if the roads really didn’t open all night.  I tried to pick up some information from the local truck drivers who tend to have the latest information.  There really wasn’t too much we could do, but it was probably better to be stuck in the rest stop with facilities than being stuck on the bus.  Finally, about an hour and a half later, the news came that the roads were open, and everyone was relieved.

It was past 9PM when we returned back to Sydney.  We were glad that the bus stop was close to our hotel.  Because we got back so late, we decided not to go to Darling Harbor for dinner as planned, but instead just to go to one of the restaurants in Chinatown area by the hotel for a light meal.  It was still pretty lively at that time down along the center “food row” of the area.  We picked a place that seems to have many people eating.  The food turned out to be ok though nothing to write home about.

During our first few days in Sydney, I found the price levels in Sydney to be relative higher than I had expected.   It could be partially the influence of my experience in Hong Kong, Singapore and China of the recent years, and partially be that we hung out primarily in tourist area or center of town.  And devaluation of the mighty US dollar probably didn’t help either.   The normal retail price for a bottle of 600ml of water was A$2.50 (about $2.25) in stores such as 7-Eleven, convenience store, etc.    To me, this is ballpark and theater prices rather than normal street price.  (The margin cost of larger bottle seems to be virtually nil.  In Brisbane, in the local grocery store Coles, we did found a store brand 600ml bottles for A$0.65; at the same time, they sell a 1.5L bottle for A$0.69.   And in a shop in the rail station in Brisbane, a 600ml bottle sold for A$2.20, while the same brand 1 liter bottle went for A$1.50.)

At the Sydney (Kingsford Smith) airport, Qantas has its own terminal for domestic flights.  Their check-in procedures is a bit different than elsewhere I have experienced.   You first get your boarding pass (through a kiosk at the terminal or online) and then check-in your baggage via an agent.  The security check-in seems to be less stringent for domestic flights.  They didn’t have the limitation on gels and creams that someone can bring with them (as would be the case at the international terminals).   The terminal itself looked fairly new and efficiently lay out.  The seats in the waiting area by the gates were comfortably cushioned.   The flight to Brisbane was a short one-hour hop, much like SF to LA.   With a bright sunny day, we did get some nice views of the coastline from the windows as we flew northward.  The best part of the flight was that Qantas has these flat 250ml bottles of water they hand out to passengers.  They are small enough to carry around in jacket pockets easily; figure they would come in handy.

While we can feel that Brisbane is a bit warmer than Sydney, as it was still early spring, it was not hot yet.  The drive from the airport into town follows the river inward from the coast.   As I later discovered, Brisbane is build upon a winding river, one that in some ways is core to the city’s identity and way of life.

After putting our stuff away in the hotel, we took a walk in the downtown pedestrian shopping mall, with a number of al-fresco restaurants at the center flanked by shops and shopping centers on either side.   Most of the ‘outside’ shops are tourist oriented souvenir shops, but there are a few interesting retail outlets, like Crocs (which makes the one piece plastic shoe that supposed to be super comfortable).  It’s actually the first time I seen these shoes.  The malls have some of the typical brand name stores, LV, Tiffany, Esprit, NineWest, etc.

For lunch, we went to Wagamama in one of the malls.  This is one of the relatively famous chain restaurants that I have heard about in Europe but have never been to one.  We had some ramen, stir fly vegetables and dumplings.  The food was good.  But let’s just say that this really gets me to rethink of ramen as an inexpensive meal.   After lunch, we took a walk across the river and just walk along the south bank where there is a parkland area bordering the river.  In the park area, there were the Museum of Modern Art, the Queensland Museum, the State Library, Performing Arts Center, Music Conservatory, etc.   Near one end of the park there are also a few shallow pools where kids could enjoy themselves.   At the end of this park area, there was a pedestrian bridge that link back across the river.  One neat thing on this bridge was a bench near the end of the bridge that would allow someone a great view of the river downstream.  I always think the view on a bridge can be real good, though sometimes you worry about the 35 mph wind blowing in your face.

We again took a trail along the river as we circled back toward the downtown area.  On this side, the trail road was virtually on the same level as the river.  It is also on this trail that it hits us that even for pedestrian/bikes they tried to put traffic on their respective lanes.  Being used to the right hand way, we were walking on the right hand side and nearly got pummeled by an on-coming bike from the other direction.

As we strolled back to the hotel, we stopped at a grocery store (Coles) to get some fruits, water, and other snacks to take back to our room.   I always enjoy going to a local grocery store, which I think provides a good view of the local favors.  After resting a bit in the room, we head back out for dinner.   For whatever reason, I had a craving for a steak (probably because I haven’t had one for a while).  Bouncing around a few places, we settled on a restaurant located at a second level with a wide terrace overlooking the streets and a stage at the center of the terrace, where some singers performed during the course of our dinner.  Liked a lot of the ‘mid-tier’ restaurants we saw there, you place and pay for an order at the counter and then they would either bring you the dish or you picked it up with a buzzer.  This was one of the latter.   I had a rib eye steak, while Jessica had a Caesars salad with grill chicken.  The food was decent if not great, but the atmosphere wasn’t bad.

After dinner, we went to the local casino that is housed in the Victorian era building that used to be part of the Australia’s Treasury, thus the name Treasury Casino.  The games were housed on different floors and rooms in the building, fitting into the original architecture layout instead of creating one huge floor.  The games were similar to those found in the US for the most part: Blackjack, Baccarat, Roulette, Poker, etc.  There is relatively more Baccarat than the casinos in the States.   And there were also plenty of slots of all denominations.  And not surprisingly, a relative high percentage of people there were Asian (no wonder Macau had surpassed Vegas in terms of gambling turnover amounts.)  Aside from walking around checking out the place, we played a bit of low stake Sic-Bo, the three dice high-low game, as we didn’t want to waste all our local currency at the tables.  We end up winning a few dollars, covering our dinner.

The next day, we woke up early for our train ride down to the Gold Coast.   The regional trains and subways are pretty much one and the same here in Brisbane.   The train to the Gold Coast wasn’t too crowded that day and was generally a fairly smooth ride with a limited number of stops.  We disembarked at Nerang, which has a bus that makes a roundtrip from the station to the edge of the beach at Surfer Paradise.  I was expecting a short bus ride, but it felt almost as long as the ride on the train. (Actually about 35 minutes vs an hour, but it just felt as long.)    To get our bearings of the place, we sat down on a bench facing the beach to look over the maps and ate an apple while looking out into the Pacific.  It was a beautiful day, clear blue sky, warm and with a little breeze to take the edge off the sun.

After ducking into a mall near the beach to scope out some better maps, we decided to walk along the beach northward toward Main Beach, up the road about a couple of miles away.  The beach along the Gold Coast is almost like one continuous long white sand beach.  At Surfer Paradise, if you looked both ways, you almost can’t see the end of the beach.  The waves were relatively benign on that day, though there were still plenty of people surfing.  What surprised me was the number of high-rise buildings along the coast.  They pretty much lined the coast.   About half way to Main beach, I saw some grandstand along the street.  I figured initially it might be for a parade.   But as I saw more and bigger grandstand appears down the road, I begin to think of other things.   Finally, I saw a banner for an Indy 300 road race (which was to take place about three weeks from when we were there.)   The race is to take place along these streets on the Gold Coast.  In some ways, we were walking on roads where 200 mph cars were to race on.

When we got to the Main Beach area, we stopped at a cafe along the main road beside the beach for an early lunch.   This area is much quieter than Surfer Paradise; a more ‘residential’ feel to it, though a lot of the apartments and houses seem to be for vacationers.   Still, it was interesting seeing various types of people drop by for something at the cafe or the convenience shop next door.  After lunch, we took a stroll through the Main Beach streets.  There was one main drag with restaurants, shops and stores.  Fairly typical of boutique shops and eateries one would find in area catered to tourists and vacationers.

We decided to head back south toward Surfer Paradise through the inland route to give us a different favor.  Arriving at an inlet junction, we took a break looking at the calm bay and the surrounding boats and activities.   We then walked across the bridge connecting the two side of the inlets.  On the other side of the bridge on the bay side was a park.  On this day, there were plenty of people, both adult groups and children groups.   There were cookouts as well.   Along the way, we took pictures of the scene across the bay, where there appears to be an amusement park with a big Ferris wheel.

At the end of the park, we cut over towards a shopping mall area and went inside for a look.  It was similar to the mall at Surfer Paradise, but with more stores.  There was a Woolworth store in the mall (an American icon that now only exist on foreign land), and we went in to get some additional batteries for the camera, figuring it would be cheaper than buying at the convenience store.  (They were less expensive but still not as cheap as what I can get on sale here in the US.)   After coming out of the mall, I looked at the streets and map and realized that I had made a wrong turn.  Instead of turning south at the bridge as I had intended to do, I actually went north.   That the amusement park on the other side of this bay was actually Sea World, which sits on a causeway on the edge of the Pacific.

After some pondering, Jessica insisted to take a taxi back toward Surfer Paradise area rather than walking back.  It was about mid-afternoon by the time we were dropped off near one of the inland rivers in Sufer Paradise.  We spent some time walking along the river and then circled our way through the other side of the town.  We spend a few minutes at the beachfront stores and picked out some souvenirs and then decide for an early dinner (quite a number of restaurants offer discounts for early diners) before taking the train back to Brisbane.   After checking a few restaurants, we picked one along in the center of the shopping hub with sidewalk seating, as much for the scene as for the food.

As we started back toward the bus stop, it was just turning dusk and the lighting gave that whole area a different look than during the daytime.  It was quite neat.  When we head back toward the beach area for one more look, a street full of vendors stalls had been setup along the boulevard next to the beach during the time we had dinner.   Most were arts and crafts related, but there were also some food (macadamia nuts anyone – for those of who though macadamia is native to Hawaii, it’s actually native to Australia.  The specie was originally discovered here) and clothing vendors as well.   Our stroll through the market pushed back our schedule a bit, but it was worth it.    Our ride back to Brisbane was mostly uneventful, but I did notice on the train a couple of security personnel went back and forth through the compartments during our ride back.

After almost a week on the go, we decided to make Saturday our ‘laid back’ day.  We planned to just walk around the Brisbane’s neighborhoods and see some local sights and museums; and just try to relax.   We started off with the St. John’s Cathedral that was just steps from our hotel.  This is the oldest, and still incomplete, cathedral in Brisbane.  Small compare to Notre Dame in Paris or the Cathedral of Seville, but it was still a respectable cathedral with some nice stain glass windows.   Then we head out towards Chinatown, which consists of about two square blocks.  It had some interesting restaurants and shops but nothing standout as unique.  Just next to Chinatown is Brunswick Street, which at least on that day had vendors lined on both side of the streets, very similar to that one would find like in Mongkok in Hong Kong or Pagoda/Temple street in Singapore’s Chinatown area, but on a much smaller scale.

We then walked towoards the Story Bridge, going through the neighborhoods and seeing people go about their routines, such as walking their dogs, eating late breakfast at the café and bringing groceries back home on foot.  The Story Bridge is the hallmark bridge in Brisbane.  The cantilever bridge was build during the Great Depression period as a public project.  Similar to the Sydney Harbour Bridge, people can climb to the top of the bridge.  (And a bit cheaper here than in Sydney.)  We cut underneath the bridge and went towards Riverside and the Eagle Street Piers, which was where we planned to have lunch by the river.   After wading through several restaurants, we decided on the Coffee Club, with tables facing the river where we could feel breezes as we ate.  It was one of those settings where one can just laid back after eating and take a nap.

But onward we went; we walked across Queen’s mall and across the Victoria Bridge over to the south bank to go to the Queensland Museum.  It contains a mixture of local history and animal exhibits.   One of the items in the museum was the wrecked plane of an early Australian pioneer pilot that crashed in the African desert, which was discovered 30 years after the crash, along with his mummified body next to the wreckage.   (No, they didn’t have the mummified body in the exhibit, although I thought it would be neat if they did have a replicate made.)    They also have an exhibit with life size figures that shows the relative sizes of the various living creatures, from birds to reptiles to kangaroos to bears to a whale.

Coming out of the museum, we decided to get more snacks before heading back to the hotel for a rest before going to the Botanical Garden at Mount Coot-Tha, which supposed to offer a panoramic view of the city.   After eating some fruit and looking up brochures in the hotel room, I discovered that the botanical garden closes at 5:30PM.  Given that it was already 4:30PM, we decided to go there tomorrow instead.   After some rest/nap and catch up on some reading, we headed out for dinner.   When we left the hotel, we were still undecided on where to go.  After circling about a bit, we decided to go back to Chinatown.  We end up selecting a restaurant that’s relatively busy (hopeful that means the food would be good).  Alas, our meal was marginal and it was relatively on the expensive side, A$50 for our 3 dishes and a bowl of soup that barely was big enough for two.    After dinner, we took a stroll around town.  Stores closed fairly early in the downtown area, by around 9:30 or so, most seemed to be closed.  Outside of the area around Queens Mall, the city was fairly quiet on the outside.

On Sunday, we went to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary.   They have 130 plus Koala bears in the park, which is one of the largest groups of koalas anywhere.   The park, in addition to koalas, also had a reserve for kangaroos and emus, along with some of the indigenous birds and animals of Australia, such as wombats, wallabies, dingoes, etc.  This is also one of the few places that allow people a chance to cuddle a koala; which is one reason we went there.   We took the more leisurely route of going there: via a boat ride down the Brisbane River.  The Sanctuary is located just off the river about 10km down the river from downtown.   The ride took about an hour and a half, but it gave us a chance to see the river scenery.   We saw many houses along the rivers, each with its own floating docks.  Most of the houses are up high at least about 10 to 20 feet above the water level.  Some of these houses are like smaller version of plantation houses.  Despite a number of water skiing and jet-skis on the river, there is still an air of tranquility on the river.   (As for water-skiing, take into consideration that the comment I heard from the boat crew that while there are no crocodiles in the river sharks has been seen.  Or was it the other way around.)

The Lone Pine Sanctuary is a quaint little reserve area tuck next to the river.  Nonetheless, with a two and a half hour window before the boat departs back, we still need to be efficient on what we see and do.  We first went through birds and small animal sections, then the first of many koala sections.   Among the first koalas we saw had a young cub with its mommy.  The cub pretty much just lay on mommy’s belly through out.  This is the first time we have seen a baby koala.   Then we went to the ‘koala cuddle and photo’ place.  This is where you can cuddle a koala and have a picture for A$15 (or more for other picture packages).   There is state regulation that a koala cannot be handled for something like more than 30 minutes a day and no more than 3 days in a row.  So, even 130 koalas may not be that many to satisfy all the demand.   After getting the pictures, we went to the kangaroo reserve.  This is bigger than the one at the Reptile Park, but one concept is the same: Feed the kangaroos.   And think they like to be fed.  After walking around the reserve for a few more pictures, we circled back to see the emus, crocs and then back to more koalas in another section of the park.   One thing I noticed is that koalas seem to be able to sleep in all sort of interesting positions.  But then if you sleep 18 hours a day, you probably can sleep anywhere.

The boat ride back home seemed even more serene, and we both dozed off for a while.

Originally we had thought about going to the Botanic Garden.  But after walking around town a bit after the getting back into town, we decided to go to the closer Roma Street Park instead.  This is a fairly good size park in the middle of the city that’s about half a mile from up the hill from our hotel.  It has several large grass area where people can play, lay around, etc.  The park also has a lake, with barbecue facilities available for people next to it.  (Most of them were being used when we were walking through.)   There is also a botanical garden with a number of interesting local flowers and plants.

Coming out of the park, we head back down toward center of town and went to one of the recommended restaurants mentioned in our guidebook.  Jo-Jo’s is officially one restaurant, but it has four theme sections (Pizza, Mediterranean, Thai and Chargrill), where you actually pay separately if you want items from different sections.  (You pay the drinks separately as well.)  Like the restaurant we went on our first night in Brisbane, there was a balcony section overlooking the Queen Anne mall, where we chose our table.   The pasta and salad we had were good, and it was relatively good value.

Just when we were finishing up our meals, it started to rain.  Since we didn’t bring an umbrella, we decided to make a run back to the hotel.  It started as a light drizzle, and we were covered by overhangs for most of the early part of our way back.  However, by the time we got close, near the train station, it started to rain real hard and aside from the train station, there wasn’t any cover the rest of the way to the hotel.   So we end up hiding out in the train station to wait for the rain to let up.   Most shops in the station were closed (with the exception of McDonalds, which is open 24 hours a day).   But with not much to do, we kind of walked about a bit.  One unexpected discovery was one of the ATMs in the train station would accept an ATM card from a Chinese bank.  (In fact, that was the only ATM of all the ones that we’ve seen that we found that had served the system used by the Chinese bank.)

While it had been warm in Brisbane, it hadn’t been humid.   However, on the way to the airport, our cab driver said that it does get humid in the summer months there.  A hot and humid Christmas is still a strange concept.  In some ways we were lucky in picking this time to visit the area.  Aside from the rain the previous night, we had almost perfect weather through out our days there.

Arriving back in Sydney, we checked into the Park Hyatt, which is in the section of town called The Rocks.  The hotel is situated on the shore across the Sydney Cove opposite the Sydney Opera House.  In fact, we were lucky to get a room that faced the Cove towards the downtown area and once on the balcony, there was a full view of the Opera House.  You can even hear the waves.   The Sydney Park Hyatt is built almost like a boutique hotel.  It’s only 4 stories and very incongruously fit into the area along the harbor front.  The rooms are also spacious with a walk-in closet, HD TV, and a nice work desk; a nice place to stay, especially if you can get a room using your hotel points.

Our key destinations for the day were the Maritime Museum, the Aquarium and the Star City Casino, all in the Darling Harbour area.   After catching the last part of the Packer-Bears Sunday Night game on ESPN (it does feel weird watching Sunday Night Football live on Monday afternoon), we started walking through The Rocks neighborhood toward Darling Harbour.   Next to the hotel is a row of waterfront restaurants.   Most of which were mentioned in our guidebook as being worth a try.  Along the streets, most of the shops in the area are geared toward visitors, from Ralph Lauren and Dior to local specialty cloth shops.  It’s a bit higher end here than in the Chinatown and Darling Harbour area.  After grabbing a quick bite in the local fast food shops, we decided to take a ferry to Darling Harbour.  From Circular Quay, the ferry made a stop in North Sydney before stopping at Darling Harbour.  This ride went in the opposite direction from the ferry we took to Manly earlier, so it gave us another view of the harbor.  Plus this ride actually went underneath the Sydney Harbor Bridge.

Once at the Darling Harbour, we start scouting for a nice place for dinner.  The entire waterfront seemed to be lined with restaurants.  We saw a couple of possibilities but nothing quite hit the spot before we went into the Maritime Museum.  The museum has a nice collection of artifacts; in addition to replicates, actual vessels and a description of history, there are also exhibits showing the people of the maritime, from the Aboriginal fishermen to the first landing at Botany Bay to crews of ships to the passengers.  There are also several retired naval ships and some replicates docked next to the gallery that people can tour.

Next, we went to the Aquarium on the other side of the harbor.  While this aquarium is not relatively big (feels a bit smaller than the Monterey Aquarium, but much bigger than the Hanghzou Aquarium), it does have a lot of indigenous marine specimens that only can be found locally.   One was the platypus, a seafaring mammal with fur, web hand and feet and a duck-like beak.   It is really one of a kind mammal.   There is also a great collection of tropical fishes, including a lot fishes that were depicted in the Nemo movie.  Of course, there were a few of the crocs and alligators as well.  (How do you tell the difference between a croc and a gator?  The best way is to see if some of their lower jar teeth are showing when their jars are closed.  Crocs’s lower teeth would be visible while gators’ lower teeth should be covered entirely by their upper teeth.)  They also have two large tanks, one for seals and one for the larger fishes and Sharks.  Both have an under the water walkway that allow people to see creatures in the water from the bottom.

After coming out of the Aquarium, we looked for a place for dinner in earnest.  Close to the Aquarium is Nick’s, a restaurant that was noted in the guidebook.  It also had two items we were looking for:  Lobster for Jessica and kangaroo filet for me.   We ordered half of a large lobster (that half a lobster is about 2 lbs) in garlic butter, which was real good.  The kangaroo filet (to me) tasted like a cross between beef and venison.  It was good, though not especially that distinctive for me.  After dinner, we went to Star City for a look.  This casino is much larger than the Treasury Casino in Brisbane and also has more of the Vegas type atmosphere.   The games were similar to those in Brisbane.  There was a craps table here, which I tried with not too much luck; too many quick 7 and out rolls.  After some uneven rolls, Jessica got a chance to roll.  She started out fairly well and made a couple of her points and frontline winners (though she has no idea what she was doing).  But just about when I have the bets layout nicely across the table, she too was cursed by the seven roll.   We then tried Sic-Bo and before we left, we tried the slots, another game Jessica has never played before.  I am really nostalgia about the old one-arm bandits with one or even five line plays.  They were simple to understand.  Hard to figure out machines with 20 lines how the payouts are determined.  Anyways, we didn’t quite have the same luck as in Brisbane, but we did have a nice time (and the casino thanked us).

The next morning we got up and had breakfast at the hotel restaurant, which had a picture frame view of the entire harbor.  The windows facing the harbor can be rolled up so that the side facing the harbor is entirely open, and the diners can feel the fresh breeze.  It’s a great setting for a breakfast (or any other meal for that matter).   This was our last full day, so the plan was to see some of the remaining sites in town and get our shopping done.  In the evening, we were to have dinner with my relatives.  We started out at the Royal Botanic Garden next to the Opera House, checking out the Government House, a former residence for the governor that sits on a hill overlooking the harbor.  While the grounds were open, the interior of the house was closed (open only from Friday thru Sunday).   From there we walked southward, along Macquarie road.  We went into the Parliament House, which is where the state parliament meets.  It’s open to the public, but only a portion of the building is accessible for the public.  Also along that street was the currency museum, which showed the history of Australian currency.   The most interesting was the exhibit on the conversion from old English fractional system to the decimal system in the 1960’s.  Speaking of currency, all of Australia’s notes are now printed on polymers rather than on paper.  It’s a technology they are exporting out to a number of different countries.

Then we visited the Australian Museum on the southern edge of Hyde Park.  The special exhibition was a showing of Photos of Africa by a National Geographic Photographer.  Most of them were taken from a helicopter; covering not only nature, but also people in cities.  Most of them were very good and gave you a surreal perspective of life.   Then we went through a section related to the local natural history and then there was a section focusing on the Aboriginal culture.  On the next level, there were section on the native minerals and a section with the full skeletons of native animals, from kangaroos to dolphins to wombats to crocs to birds.   While not quite comparable to similar museums in Washington, Paris or London, it was still a good museum to visit.

After a quick lunch at a local sandwich shop, the rest of the day was spent shopping before heading off to meet up with my cousins and uncles for dinner. We hit a number of the downtown department stores and the souvenir shops in the area.  We had nothing special in mind, but just look for things that interest us.

During breakfast the next morning, as I stared into the Opera House from my seat, I felt sad that our trip is ending.  In some ways, we only had scratched the surface of the places we visited.   And we really only went to two places.   Only hope that I get another chance to go and see more.