Hello from Down Under...Sydney to be exact!!

At the end of April I was able with two of my Chicago friends, to take a trip to Sydney Australia. We took a flight out of San Fran and sat in Business class on the way over. We were even lucky enough to sit together, even though we flew stand by. It was a 14 hour flight, but was to me like a fun road trip, with bigger seats and more space to run around. We mostly sat around and played games on Andrews Iphone and talked, trying to force ourselves to stay awake until we should go to sleep Sydney time, helps with the Jet lag. I was one of the only ones who made it, but was able to see the Hawaiian Islands as we passed them by. Well when we finally got to Sydney we couldn’t get off the airplane until they sprayed for bugs. Apparently the planes pesticide papers had expired 4 days pervious and so before we could get off they had to come on with aerosol bug spray and spray everywhere. You can imagine the ruckus that caused. Everyone freaked out, but I just took it as a photo op. We finally got off and headed on our way, so I thought. The first day was full of little snags of not having a room rented, not knowing how to get to a hostel, figuring out transportation and then trying to find parking. 8 hours after we landed, we were able to finally get downtown to sight see. We went to an area known as the rocks, which is the oldest settled part of Sydney. This is one of the most Touristy spots and is right on the Harbour. The oldest house in Sydney is located here as well. It’s called Cadman's Cottage and was built in 1816, once home to John Cadman. After eating some Pizza with hot Salomi and whole olives with the pits still in them, we ventured a short distance over to the Harbour to look at the Sydney Opera House and then walk down to the end of the doc to take pictures of the Harbour Bridge. As we sat and admired the view I looked down into the water below and saw hords of Jelly Fish. They almost covered the water, defiantly wouldn’t want to take a swim there. It reminded me of all the dangerous animals they have here. They have the most dangerous Spider, Snake and Jelly Fish. Well after we saw the bridge and Opera house I had to run back to the car, grab my bags and head off on the Train to Parmatta, where my friend Kelly Conlon lived. I was supposed to be here the first day myself so I could go hang out with Kelly, but my friends decided to come a bit early. Well it was Kelly’s birthday so she got a group of friends together along with her twin sister and we went out to celebrate. We went out to eat and then after we ate ice cream and cookies, while watching a movie. Kellys roomie Amie had me try tons of different kinds of Aussie food, Milo hot chocolate, Tim Tams, some other little things and she even made me lunch for the next day, a veggie mite sandwich. Vegie mite is made from yeast extract, so it’s kind of Salty and sour as in fermented sour. I don’t know how to explain it. Anyway I had tons of fun with my Aussie experience hanging out with Aussies. The next day Kelly took me up to her work, which was the church offices in Sydney which was right next to the temple. I was able to attend a session in the Sydney temple and then enjoy the grounds for awhile till my friends picked me up and we then headed off to the Featherdale Wildlife Park. This was one of my most favorite parts of the trip. The park lets you get up close and personal with the animals. Some of the animal are fenced in but many are just out roaming around at your feet. I was able to pet A Wallaby
A Kangaroo A Koala An Emu and see lots of other animals native to Australia, like the Tasmanian Devil, which is a lot uglier than I had anticipated. A wombat, apparently they bite, so there was not petting going on there. The most poisonous snake in the world Inland Taipan . I wouldn’t want to be in that section of the zoo in an earth quake, They had like 6 of the most poisonous snakes in that room. There were tons more and I loved it. It was the most fun, I’d had at a zoo, since I was a kid probably. Actually, I think it is the most fun I’ve ever had a the zoo! After the zoo we ventured on up the road into the famous Blue Mountains, so named for the bluish tinge the range takes on when viewed from a distance. I thought that they would be more desolate, but they were populated and beautiful. One thing that was kind of weird to me was to see the leaves changing colors in April. It was fall there for them and very pretty. We were able to see some waterfalls. The red cliffs dropped straight down and were covered in green. It was a beautiful back drop for the water to cascade from. I wish we would have had more time here. You could feel the moister in the air and it finally gave way into buckets of rain.
(this is what the three sisters should look like...not my picture)
We ran back to the car and started heading up the road to another rock formation we wanted to see called the three sisters. The modern day tourism industry has created a legend about the three sisters that says that three sisters fell in love with three men from a neighbouring tribe, but marriage was forbidden by tribal law. Battle ensued, and the sisters were turned to stone by an elder to protect them, but he was killed in the fighting and no one else could turn them back. We tried to race the weather, but when we got to the town of Katoomba we found it cold and fog filled. We could barely see in front of our faces, let alone the mountains. We decided to get ourselves some food and then found a hotel to stay the night, since it was twilight and bad weather, we thought that if we stayed, we’d be able to see stuff the next morning. To our dismay when we awoke, the view was the same. The fog was dense and thick, but we decided to take a walk down by Echo Point anyway and take a picture of the view, which looks like San Francisco on most days, just gray. We then had to head back to Sydney and drop the car off. I was perfectly fine getting rid of that scary little thing. I was the only one that was to drive it, but the stupid thing was a stick, but even worse was the steering wheel was on the right and you had to drive on the left. It would have been fine, well sort of if I didn’t have to think about all of that at once. I only almost killed us a couple of times, but freaked everyone out most of the time. I finally let my friend Andrew drive. We then took a ride on a ferry out to Manly beach. The ride was so beautiful and the beach was amazing. This is a picture looking back at Sydney from the ferry anyway, Manly is across the harbor from Sydney. I think it’s the best place to go for souvenirs. It reminds me of a boardwalk beach town in California. The ice cream was great and the view was amazing. I think I liked Manly beach better than Bondi beach, which is more famous. Anyway after taking some pictures and walking around we headed back on the ferry. We decided to stand in the bottom part of the boat this time because the waves splashed up and I wanted to get some cool pictures. Well there were a lot of people in the front of the boat headed back. I think it made it heavier because we got a lot wetter than the people did going over. I thought I had the timing right to get a good picture but instead I got drenched and I sadly used my camera as a shield against the water, instead of me shielding the camera. My camera didn’t last very long after that. Salt water and cameras don’t mix. Anyway I’ve never seen people scatter so quickly. We stayed up there and enjoyed the view. It was worth it. We were going to go up in the Center Point tower to get a great view of the city, but it cost 25 bucks and I had just destroyed my camera, so I wasn’t in the mood. We did walk along Macquarie street and saw the Parliament House, Sydney hospital, which is an amazing old building, outside the Royal Botanical gardens and took a stroll threw Sydney’s Hyde park. It weirded me out that so many place here had the same names as in London. We also got to see St Mary’s Cathedral, which is made of a brilliant red stone and beautiful to see. It is also the largest Cathedral in Australia, but not the highest. Later that night we were able to walk around China town, eat Chinese food and walk down by Darling Harbour to see some of the boats in the maritime museum. It was the only time I was able to see any of the lights of Downtown Sydney at night. The harbour was beautiful. I wish we could have seen the Opera house as well. There were lots of street performers to watch besides just sitting and relaxing on the shore line. The next day we took a bus out to Bondi beach and relaxed on its beautiful shores. This beach was a lot less crowded than Manly and the water wasn’t very cold to swim in either. I didn’t get to stay long before I had to head back and go to lunch with my friend Warren Dautzenburg. He is an elder from my mission. The funny thing was that we just ran into him on the street. I was walking along and all of a sudden he was right in front of me. It was so random, but I was grateful. It was fun seeing him again. We were supposed to go hiking around the rocky shores of Watson Bay north of Bondi beach later that afternoon but the plans were changed and I ended up just taking the ferry back across the harbour right when I met back up with my friends. Maybe next trip. I saw the light houses and rocks from the bus, so that is ok at least I saw them. That night we didn’t do much of anything because Andrew got food poisoning from bad sushi and Chelsea was sunburned really bad. I ran errands for them, but it was nice to get out and walk around. The next day Chelsea and I headed back down to the rocks, which we visited almost every day, to see the Opera house, and also to eat at our favorite place called Pancakes on the rocks. They had the most amazing crepes and pancakes and they didn’t just have sweet stuff. I had some with chicken and a creamy sauce smothered with parmesan cheese. It was delicious!! Anyway the time went by way to fast and I soon found myself climbing aboard a United Boeing 747 in economy class. I was unlucky enough to get a middle seat, but blessed that the seat next to me was broken, so I could spread out. I did get a beautiful view of Sydney as we flew over and I got to say good bye to that beautiful city that felt a little bit like home.