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Cairns & Sydney
September 25 | Comments (0)
Before we left Queensland Jen's cousin took us up to Kuranda where we took the skyrail down to Cairns. The skyrail is a 6 person gondola that takes you over the top of the rainforest and includes a couple of stops along the way where you can see the forest up close and get a guided tour. It's a great way to see a rainforest - you can see for miles. We didn't see much wildlife but we did get to see some cockatoos searching for food in the top of the canopy.
We arrived in Sydney late afternoon on Wednesday and realised that we weren't really dressed for the occasion - having traveled in SE Asia for 2 months we didn't anticipate how cold it would be. Funny though, if we were coming from Canada, we would have been happy in shorts.
We spent most of Thursday shopping for shoes and a sweater for me (and keeping out of the morning rain!) and met up with some friends for a drink in the evening. Friday we walked around the harbour to see the Opera House and the Botanical Gardens with its hundreds of flying foxes (bats). In the afternoon we took in a movie, Ratatouille, which we both very much enjoyed - I think it's a very close second to The Incredibles as far as Pixar animation goes. It was also a great relief to our sore feet - never break in new shoes whilst visiting a new city!
Saturday we walked across the Sydney Harbour Bridge as I had to get a picture of the creepy entrance to Luna Park. It's like a set for a horror movie. On the way back we were almost fined $500 for walking on the wrong side of the bridge - thank god for our accents, the security guard just turned us around. More shopping in the afternoon as I had to find a shirt that I'd seen on a guy at breakfast the day before; I asked him where he got it and it turns out he's promoting the brand in Australia and left a message for me later that day with details on where to buy them. We had dinner at Zia Pina (great pizza!) on George Street in The Rocks for the second time (did I mention it has great pizza!).
A great end to our Australian visit - next stop is San Francisco for 3 days and then home for a rest.