Daniel and Marysia around Australia: Sydney, NSW.

Can you guess where we are??

Having left Toronto, the weather turned pretty sour. We stayed at a lovely place on the coast called Avoca Beach. We'd planned to stay a couple of days but the weather was not good so we decided to make our way into Sydney a day earlier. We contacted Lane Cove National Park, which is the only caravan park about 10 minutes drive into Sydney city central, via public transport. They confirmed that we could arrive the day earlier so our stay would be for 4 days. However, since we
had travelled this far south into New South Wales the weather had deteriorated. The first 48 hours were unbelievably wet.

The approach from the North into the city by car

We were so excited to be here that the rain, didn't stop us from taking a drive across the Sydney Harbour Bridge into town so that we could familiarise ourselves with where we needed to be for the walk on Friday. We managed to find parking so headed off to The Rocks, locating the Bridge Walk Building. Rain having let up for a little, we walked across to Circular Quay and onto the Opera House. The clouds were so grey, ominous that after some time with obligatory photos taken we made
our way back to the car in the rain.

That afternoon once it started raining around 4.00 in the afternoon it pelted down all night until the next morning. It was so bad that for the first time during the entire trip we actually turned the heater on in the van! We really couldn't go anywhere the next day for the rain but we made our way by car into Chatswood shopping centre to do some supplies shopping for the next few days. Sydney is so busy, the roads are so narrow, everything seems to be living on top of everything. Lucky for us we didn't get lost either in finding Lane Cove National Park, Chatswood and back just using a road map!

It's HUUUGE!

On our third day we'd had enough of the rain and being stuck in the van! We headed out with our waterproof jackets, umbrella in hand through the rain making our way to North Ryde railway station on foot to take us into Sydney Central. We had a great day with the rain eventually letting up for a couple of hours as we treaded on foot to the Sydney Tower Eye, through the beautiful historic Queen Victoria building, The Strand before deciding on a light lunch followed by a well needed coffee.

We thought we'd go to Kings Cross on Friday after the bridge walk, but realised that the bridge walk would be 3 and a half hours so by the time we finished we reckoned we might be a tad tired to head to Kings Cross. With coffee into us we headed into the subway and onto the train to take us to Kings Cross. It was very ecclectic, very much like St.Kilda...and then the rain came back. Time done, day done, walking done...we were pooped deciding to head back to the subway back to our van for the night.

Tomorrow is our Bridge Walk. The forecast for tomorrow is more rain. It's also cold at 16 degrees! The Bridge Walk will not be cancelled, in it's information guide, unless it's an electrical storm! We're ready to catch the train to take us into town, have our clothes organised. No camera is allowed to be taken up with you, so a little disappointed there. Sydney has only had 45 minutes of sunshine all week! We'll let you know how we go in the next couple of days!