Condensing Sydney

The sun shone down on the rain-soaked city, reflecting off the river and creating a rainbow that stretched from the far end of the Harbour Bridge to behind the Opera House – the end to another perfect day spent in a magnificent city – Sydney.
Australia is one country that many people dream of visiting, yet not everybody actually takes the leap to get there. After all, it is quite an immense leap to make, starting with a thirteen-hour flight from London to Singapore. •My forty-minute layover there was filled with a quick change in a cramped toilet and the purchase of a magazine and a postcard. After that, you have to board the same plane for another nine hours to reach Sydney or Melbourne, the most popular starting points for tourists. This, to my mind, is the most excruciating part – you have just completed one of the longest flights of your life and then you have to get back on and do it all again – in the same seat, with the same films and television shows on the entertainment system, alongside many of the same passengers as before. As you look out of the window and see the Australian coast appear before you, you relax and tell yourself that you are practically there – BUT YOU ARE NOT. In fact, you have another four or five hours before you finally arrive at your destination. Now why put yourself through that – is it worth it? The answer is most definitely ‘yes’.
I visited Sydney in early April 2003. I had initially flown into Melbourne and had spent a few days there before visiting friends in New Zealand for a week. Melbourne is a beautiful city, and I expected Sydney to be pretty much the same. Well, I was mistaken – Sydney is even more striking. There are not many sights that can take your breath away as much as driving into the city from Kingsford Smith Airport and being greeted by such historical landmarks as the Opera House and the AMP Tower.
My cab took me to my hotel for the stay, the ‘Central Park Hotel’, on Castlereagh Street in the city’s Central Business District. A very modern boutique hotel, I had booked a split-level loft suite complete with Jacuzzi bath, which was an absolute bargain at only AUD $195 per night (£1=AUD$2.50 as at 28th August 2006 ). Now my true mission was set to begin – is it possible to see the bulk of what Sydney has to offer in only four nights?
Not wanting to waste any time, I went straight out into the warm night air. Despite its being Australia’s autumn, the temperature at seven o’clock in the evening was akin to being in England on a hot summer’s afternoon, but without the humidity. It was pleasant to be able to stroll around without the need for a jacket but to also not have sweat glistening on your forehead. Not having planned anything for the evening, I decided to walk five minutes to the nearest subway stop (Town Hall), to get to Circular Quay where I had excellent views of the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge.
Sydney Opera House really is an amazing structure. Building began in 1957 and on its completion in 1973 was opened by the Queen . Its sail-like roofs are magnificent, designed to echo the waves in the sea and the sails on the yachts in the harbour, and are visible from miles around. Covered in white ceramic tiles, it seems that every glint of light shines off them, making the building sparkle with the multi-coloured lights of the city’s skyline. As I watched the sun set over the harbour, I sighed contentedly. Sometimes you can find perfection in the simplest things. Waking up on my first morning in Sydney, I decided I wanted to experience some real Australian wildlife – albeit from a safe distance, so I decided to visit Taronga Zoo. A ferry ride away from Circular Quay, a combination ticket can be bought for $28.40 that covers your return ferry and entrance to the zoo. This is a great place to take your kids – they will love seeing Australia’s native species (as will the adults!). You can walk alongside wild wallabies, have photos taken next to a cuddly koala for the princely sum of $2, (but watch “grabby” children as it is a strictly “look-but-don’t-touch” policy), and a reptile house that will both fascinate and terrify. The zoo is extremely big on conservation, and is currently planning to bring eight Asian elephants from Thailand to work on a breeding programme. The highlight of my visit was on my descent from the zoo to the exit, when a florescent-green lizard ran across my path. Managing to fight the urge to scream, I tried to discover where he had run to but he had made his escape. Whether he was a visitor or a fugitive remains to be seen, but his presence just made me aware of how different this country was to the UK.
Ideally, you should allocate a whole day to Taronga, but as I was trying to fit in as much as possible in my short trip I left mid-afternoon and returned to the city to go shopping in the Queen Victoria Building. An austere construction, dominated by a huge glass dome in the ceiling, it is filled with higher-end boutiques and souvenir shops. It is filled with interesting things, including a letter from Queen Elizabeth II to the Citizens of Sydney to be opened and read by the Lord Mayor of Sydney in the year 2085 . If you want to spend an hour in a building that doesn’t remind you of a clinical American mall, then the QVB is a great place to do this.
Afterwards, I decided to combine Ozzie cuisine with adventure, by dining in the AMP Tower’s revolving buffet restaurant. The tower actually has two revolving restaurants – the first is more cordon bleu and aimed at couples, whilst the buffet one that I visited is great for families and groups. For $39 for lunch or $49 for dinner, you can eat as much as you like. This is the ideal way to sample meats that you wouldn’t find in the freezer of your local Sainsbury store – crocodile, kangaroo and emu all featured on the menu that evening. Feeling brave, I decided to risk a taste of kangaroo. My evaluation? Well, it wasn’t too bad – it is a dry red meat with a strong, distinct flavour. I certainly am not planning to put it in my next casserole; however I am glad I experienced it. That was quite enough of exciting meats for me though, so I moved on to cheesecake with a champagne cocktail (or two).
Okay, so I had spent over one full day in Sydney and hadn’t yet visited a beach. Realising I needed to resolve this issue, I woke up bright and early the next morning to put on my vest and shorts, packed a bottle of suntan lotion and a trashy novel into a bag and headed off for one of the world’s most famous beaches – Bondi. It does take almost an hour to get there, but I had heard from friends that the beauty of the beach made it worth every minute – pure white sand, the deep blue ocean shimmering in the sunlight, hordes of tanned surfers making the most of the glorious weather… unfortunately, I experienced none of this. I happened to visit Bondi Beach on the first day all year that it chose to rain – torrential rain, sheets of rain that prevented you from seeing further than ten feet in front of you.
As I dashed along the seafront, desperate to find one dry spot in the vicinity, I happened upon a man casually walking his dog. ‘Nice day!’ he greeted happily as we passed. I smiled and found a building in the middle of the beach – the Bondi Beach Life Saving Club (which was the first in Australia ) and entered its adjoining café, the main feature of which was a dirty fish tank with two lobsters inside. Declining food, I ordered a cup of tea and dried off in front of the fire, all the while aware of my spectators swimming beside me.
On the bus back into the city, the grey clouds magically blew apart as the wind died down to a breeze and the sun shone through the gap, set in a bright blue sky. I stopped myself from swearing out loud and prepared to enjoy the rest of the day. Determined to see something of Sydney’s shoreline, I booked a ninety-minute “Harbour Highlights” boat tour with Captain Cook Cruises. With the rainbow overhead, I was treated to views of the Opera House, the Aquarium and the capacious houses of the rich and famous in the Eastern Suburbs before returning under the bridge back to Darling Harbour. The houses are probably some of the most expensive in the city. I stared in disbelief as one yacht left the harbour to be pulled up a slope onto its own driveway directly from the water.
Sydney is quite an easy city to be a pedestrian in, so after the cruise I took a leisurely twenty-minute walk to the Rocks, the historical area of the city. It was originally home to some of Sydney’s [native] Aborigines before it became the country’s first European settlement back in the late 18th century . Now it is a tourist haven, filled with shops, restaurants and museums. Feeling peckish, my taste buds led me into the simply titled “Pancakes on the Rocks”. I say simply titled because that is the only food on the menu – pancakes. Of course, there are several variations on the humble favourite – I opted for “Devil’s Delight”, an evil concoction involving chocolate crêpes, fresh strawberries and a combination of cream and chocolate additions that made me speechless as I stuffed the first forkful into my mouth.
As I woke up early again on my last day of the trip, I felt suddenly panicked – how could I say I ‘did’ Sydney in four days if I hadn’t taken in any culture In a cosmopolitan city I knew it could not too difficult to combat this. I got straight onto the Internet to look up museums and events happening in the city that day. I wandered on to the Opera House’s webpage and managed to get a centre row seat in the back of the stalls for that afternoon’s performance of the Australian Ballet’s “Romeo and Juliet”. No last-minute price hikes here – the ticket only cost $80 including tax.
Needing to fill my time before the show, I decided upon the Australian Museum as my culture injection. It has a good mixture of natural history and exhibits showing how Australia came to be. It really needed more time to do it justice – the couple of hours I spent there was certainly not enough, but I had to leave for my 1.30pm matinee.
The ballet was in the Opera Theatre that fills one of the larger sails.• Being in there was totally mesmerizing, just knowing I was in the Opera House, let alone enjoying the beautiful dance and the amazing acoustics. Afterwards, I decided to travel the full loop of the monorail, opened in July 1988, which gives fantastic views of the city for only $2.50 a trip. Thankfully it is not a long trip, as throughout the journey you are played the annoyingly catchy ‘Do the Loop!’ theme tune.•
I woke up the next morning and caught a cab back to the airport, asking myself “Did I do it? Did I ‘do’ Sydney in four nights?” The answer is, quite obviously I think, ‘no’. Although I managed to do a lot in my stay, there was still a lot more I wanted to see – the Aquarium, the Harbour Bridgewalk, Bondi in the sun… a city so full of history, culture and experiences needs time to soak it all up, and even packing in what I did is nowhere near good enough. I’m already planning a trip back next year – and I’ll be spending a lot longer there this time!