Sydney Gateway August 2012

We take this Hari Raya Puasa holiday opportunity to have a long break at Sydney. It took a long journey to fly to Sydney. 8 hours in the flight, we have 3 movies, 3 meals and few short sleeps. What a great experience flying with Qatar Airway. The time different with Malaysia is 2 hours. We finally reached at Sydney Kingsford International airport at 6am. A long queue at the imigration in this early morning. When we past the imigration, we were asked to see another officer for further questioning. Do we look like coming for holiday, don't we?

 

What a tire journey! We quickly headed to our hotel, Baywater Hotel Sydney at King Cross but no room available to check-in yet. So, we have our first breakfast at the Cafe next to our hotel. The sandwices and bacon filled our stomach. It was winter time here, so it was cold. The Australians were bathing in the sun and with their sunglasses while enjoying their weekend breakfast with friends or family. After the breakfast, finally we get an early check-in. Without delay, we took a rest.

 

After a good sleep, we catched a train to our first station, Circular Quay. The train system in Sydney is called MyTrain. We bought MyMulti 3 pass for both of us, this can be used for most train, buses, ferry, city lightrail and to Blue Mountain and Hunter Valley. Once aboard from the train, we saw the beautiful scenery. The Sydney Harbour, Opera House, Sydney Harbour Bridge view just in front of us. We walked around and have our good photos here. We saw the sunset at Harbour Bridge, it's yellow-redwish light make the bridge more awesome. In Sydney, the sky turns dark at 6pm.

 

After a tire photos shooting, we have our dinner at Hungry's Jack. It's a fast food restaurant selling a very delicious bacon. Before end our day, we have a bite at Guylian Cafe. Here we taste some wine and Belgium chocholate pie.

 

Next day, we started our day by walking down the King Cross road to Oxford Rd to find for contact lenses. The optometrist asked for the prescription from the doctor when we want to buy a contact lenses. After this, it's time to visit Toranga Zoo. We took a ferry at Circular Quay to Toranga Zoo jetty. Here we saw kangaroo, koala bear and Australia's finest collection of native animals. We'll surprised with Zoo Sky Safari, we took it down the hill.

 

In the evening, we took ferry to Darling Harbour. Darling Harbour is a busy place that can find food, entertaiment and shopping. Sydney Aquarium, Sydney Wildlife, Madame Tussade, Sydney Convention Center, Imax, cafes and restorants are along the harbour. A monorail service runs from the Central Business District to Darling Harbour and skirts the harbour, making stops at points around the harbour. Here we have our dinner at Hard Rock Cafe Sydney, then we took the ferry back to Circular Quay and by bus back to our hotel. There were only few of passengers inside the night time ferry, it's like we own the ferry!

 

Next morning, we had our quick breakfast at 'Smile backery' near our hotel, then we catched an innercity train at 7.30am at Central Station heading to Katoomba. We reached Katoomba at 9.30am,  here is freezing cold. Outside the train station, there are agents to sell the Blue Mountain packages. We took a package that include blue mountain ride, skyway, cableway and railway.

 

Our first stop at Blue Mountain was Echo Point. Here is a good place to capture the mountains, valleys and Giant Stair. Then we took the skyway to have a nice view of Three Sisters and Katoomba Falls. At the scenic world's cafe, we took our lunch chicken wrap and sandwich while having the views of the Three Sisters. After lunch, we experienced the steepest Scenic railway into the valley and then took a walk through ancient rainforest, capture sunbeams and dappled light breaking through the rainforest canopy. There was a coal mine, and the railway was actually used for coal mine transportation. Then we had our cableway experience went up to the scenic world building at 1030m above sea levels.

 

After this we took bus route No. 1, passing Katoomba town and Leura town to lookout point. Here is another side of view of Blue Mountain and Blue Mountain National Park. From here, we took a 45min walk to Leura Cascade.

When we back to Katoomba town, we just walked in a Cafe and we was suprised that this cafe is opened by a chinese couple from Malaysia. After so many days, we finally can have a bowl of rice, Hainan Chicken Rice. The roasted chicken, the chili and the rice are exactly taste same in Malaysia, even better. We noticed that this chef (owner) has been awarded many prizes. You may visit them at Unique Patisserie.

 

After back from Katoomba, we took a city light rail at central station to Paddy Market and Chinatown. Paddy Market has closed, so we just went to Chinatown at opposite the Paddy market to find for our supper. It is like an international food street, but major in chinese restaurant. We were attracted to a Malaysian restorant, Dixon. They have a Malaysian boy to have the live show of roti canai making, but we ordered nasi lemak, teh tarik and Penang prawn mee for myself.

Next day, we went to Chinatown again to try Dim Sum. Then we walked to Darling harbour to take a speedboat for whale watching. When we were  at the sea far from the harbour, we saw three big whales coming  to us. Wow, they are huge and they just turn around at our boat. A super great experience!

 

In the afternoon, we went to Fish Market. Yes, here is a fish market. We tried some fresh olysters, lobster, prawns and a pieces of grill salmon with chips, eat with white wine. What a good try and they are cheap!

 

Then we bought some souvenirs at cheaper price at Paddy Market before we took a monorail to Queens Victoria Building (QVB) at Central Business District (CBD). This grand building elaborate Romanesque architecture. In front hte QVB is City Town Hall. From here, we walked down to the Circular Quay when all the shops has closed at 6pm. We planned to take ferry to Watson's Bay, but unfortunately the ferry service closed at 3pm. So, we took a bus to Watson's Bay. There are nothing much at Watson's Bay at night.

 

Come to the last day of our trip, we enjoyed ourself with our last breakfast at the stall at our hotel. The wrap was very nice! Before we go for our last shop, we walked around at Hyde Park. Then, we walked to Pitt Street Mall to have our shopping. The weather has turn hot. The Bondi beach is opened, but we get not enough time to go. Again, we have a nice experience flying with British Airways back to Singapore. We are the one of the few Asian in the flight.

 

Hope you enjoy reading. Here are some useful information if you also plan to holiday at Sydney.

 

Accomodation: Baywater Hotel Sydney

                         17 Bayswater Road, Kings Cross

                        http://www.sydneylodges.com/lodges/the-bayswater-sydney/

Transport: MyMulti 3 pass (including train to bleu mountain but not include airport line)

                 http://www.131500.com.au/tickets/fares/myzone

 

Food: Hungry's Jack http://www.hungryjacks.com.au/
       Sydney Guylian Cafe http://www.guyliancafe.com.au/
       Unique Patisserie, Katoomba
       Smile Backery- at everywhere
       Dixon Restaurant- Dixon street, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
       Hard Rock Cafe Sydney, Level 2, Harbourside Centre, Darling Harbour, Sydney
       Sydney Fish Market http://www.sydneyfishmarket.com.au/

Shopping: Queens Victoria Building http://www.qvb.com.au/
                 Pitt Street Mall http://www.pittstreetmall.com.au/
                 Paddy Market http://www.paddysmarkets.com.au/