Sydney 2, NSW

We've been to the tip of Cape York, today we reached the top of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. The weather forecast predicted rain for the day. We set out with our weatherproof jackets, hiking shoes, backpack, camera, phone, extra socks, runners and an umbrella at 9.30 in the rain on the way to North Ryde railway station. Purchasing our tickets we made our way a long way underground to take the train into Wynyard. Daniel insisted we walk slowly to our destination, The Rocks, to the Bridge Climb Centre so that we wouldn't get too tired and too hot! Finally arriving I took some photos of the Gift Certificates that we'd been carrying with us for the last 11 months. Daniel a little nervous as he can wasn't sure if his legs were going to turn to jelly for a little fear of heights.

The time came, the procedure started, we were in a small group with 4 other people whom we were all asked to introduce ourselves to and to familiarise ourselves with as we would be in their company for the next 3 and a half hours. With the introductions done we headed into the change rooms. Given a 'space suit' like outfit (1 piece) and waterproof pants over that we headed into another section to meet our tourguides, Michael and Matt. We were additionally equipped with a safety belt, that carried waterproof raincoats (for those that wanted to use them if it rained), a fleece for the head, a beanie for the head (which Daniel took), gloves, a hanky, a radio tansmitter, earphones, glasses straps and straps that attached all of the above to the suit and/or the belt. We felt like we were being dressed like astronauts! Then we had a practice session on how to climb properly on the ladders and down the ladders. Once over this procedure which took about 45 minutes we were ready to head out onto the bridge!

I can honestly that my feet felt like jelly for the first few minutes as we headed out onto the structure. A few deep breaths to overcome the fear and we were all on our way. Believe it or not the rain just held off at that moment as we made progress out on and above as Michael gave us the history of the building of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. With Daniel behind me I felt pretty safe in the event I would fall backwards, I knew where I'd be landing!

Daniel was probably kidding me that he had a fear of heights, he had no problem at all as he managed to climb stairs faster than I could clear them for him to make way after me! We stopped at various points on the bridge for photos taken by Michael. The history of the Bridge was fantastic. It truly has to be one of the world's most famous structures! You need to read about it. I don't think I have enough space in my blog to go through its entirety, so my apologies for that.

Believe this but it only started to spit lightly on our descent. At this point Daniel and I both put on our waterproof jackets. The sights from both the east and west were fantastic even though the weather was overcast and grey. It was an amazing journey. I said to myself that we could do this....I mean we had done the Eifel Tower in 1984!...yeah but we were soooooo much younger then! On our return trip we thanked our guides, filled out a questionnaire, changed into our normal gear. It was a great experience and we just want to say to the four of the kids thank you for this great experience!

It was about 3.00 in the afternoon, our feet were actually quite sore but we ventured back into central Sydney for a well deserved coffee and this time we splashed out on a Cronoli and French Vanilla slice as we rested our poor feet before heading back to the train station for the return journey for our last night at Lane Cove National Park, more rain before we packed up the next day to head off to see friends in Liverpool.