alright, so my exams are over and done with, i feel reletively comfortable with how they all went. oceanography went so much better than i expected thanks to mike. and they're out of my hands now, can't fret about it anymore and so i won't.
so sydney! yes i need to tell you all about that still... :P
mike and i got into sydney sunday morning and made it to our little hotel without a hitch. there were hostels but they were almost all in the red-light district, and plus since it was just the 2 of us the hotel was actually about the same price. and the room was nice, we had a little fridge and our own bathroom and a balcony and everything. and it was just a block away from the red-light district BUT we were nice and close to a cute little cafe and fountain and a decent bar that was open all the time - not to mention the woolworths right down the street that we used to stock our fridge. so we got settled and went for a walk about town. mike navigated the subway system like he lived there and soon we were at the harbor - you know, with the opera house and the bridge. these landmarks each have nicknames lol, the bridge is the coat hanger and the opera house is the scrumming nuns - if you know rugby you'll get that if not i could try to explain... heehee. anyway we wandered and took fun pictures and walked through the gardens for a while, and then we went up to "the rocks" where some of the bars were. there was this german bar we went to 3 nights while we were there for happy hour, and delicious beer of course. after a drink we found this wonderful little itallian restaurante and splurged on a wonderflu dinner :) oh the veal and the house wine and mmmmm. we got icecream on the way home and made an early night of it.
monday we got up for the wine tour of the hunter valley - famous for shiraz! i bought a sweet shiraz at the first cellar door, and omg it was amazing with black cake. AMAZING! it wasn't a dessert wine, just very sweet and lovely and even julie loved it! anyhoo we hit up 2 more wineries before lunch, each quite entertaining. and the area we had 2 hours for lunch in had 4 cellar doors, a cheese factory and a chocolate factory. OMG. so mike and i had our wonderfully cheap and delicious picnick lunch we'd packed and went around to collect some tastey things - fudge, bree, cheddar, belgian chocolate (dark) and 2 more bottles... that never made it out of sydney lol. they were amazing and delectable. we got back to the hotel not-too-late and settled for the night after good pub grub and beer.
tuesday was our first day of diving in sydney, and o goodness it was great. the guy running it, rob, picked us up at the hotel in the morning and drove us out to are island. if you've seen mission impossible 2, the scene with the little fortress island? ya that is bare island, i dove there :P. the bridge was out so we had a rocky entrance which was interesting to say the lease - crawling down the rocks in a full scuba kit was not exactly easy! but we made it down there and super-man jumped into the very cold water. i wasn't actually very cold for this dive because i had a 5mm wetsuit that fit me, good thick gloves, and a nice hood. but when i first jumped in i lost the weights from my side pocket, so after the surface swim (akward when you're unevenly weighted) i couldn't sink. luckily rob had enough extra weight to allow me to sink properly and the rest of the dive went really smooth. it was a great experience to dive in the cold/temperate waters of sydney as opposed to the tropical waters i'd dove in before. it was just new and different and so cool! we saw lovely starfish and nudies and urchins and even a cuttlefish (cuddle fish if you happen to be me and dan :P but he wasn't there lol) we got out at the end and found my lsot weights, which was gooooood, and went up to chill by the van for the surface interval. rob had soup and biscuts for us which was lovely. unfortunately i had to stay in my wetsuit for the surface interval and it was quite windy, so by the time we were getting ready for the second dive i was visibly shaking and SO COLD! we called the dive on accout of me freezing and rob was really good about it all. so i shivvered all the way back to the hotel and we had a bit more time for a nap and shower and such, and we ate at the burbon bar down the street for tea.
wednesday was the second day of diving, and we got up early with our dive gear to get out to mannly beach via subways and ferry. we found the dive shop on mannly and we weren't alone that day for the dive. we had our guide and 3 other divers with us. it was a really nice day for it and we drove off to the beach after i rented my equipment. we got to the beach and unfortunately, and for the first time, the wetsuit was too small for me. it was a farmer jane 2-pice and the legs just didn't want to get past my thighs so it was super tight and made it more difficult to breathe. and i was cold the whole dive. other than that it was a great dive, we saw big schools of fish and many nudies and a weedy seadragon which was sweet, but i was deffinately ready to go in soon after that. luckly it wasn't windy so i didn't die of cold when i got out, but again we didn't to the second dive. instead we enjoyed lunch at a nice little bistro before taking the ferry back for a shower and nap... again. cold water diving makes me sleepy! then we went out again for delicious german beer and pub grub, and it was a good night.
thursday was supposed to be our day to make it up to the blue mountains for some hiking and scenery BUT that was thwarted by weather. it would have been miserable. so we made it a relaxed and laid back day of watching scrubs, firefly, sleeping in and eventually going to wander around the harbor and down town. we were going to stay up all night again since we had a 4am taxi to catch for the flight but we did actually get some sleep. and we made it back friday without incident. except that apparently sydney airport closes at night??? who closes an airport! we had to wait like half an hour before we could check in because no one was there. wierd.
anyway now i'm back and done with exams and should be packing. should. because tonight is lazy, tomorrow i go to stockies and other places and cook for people again, tuesday i want to see magnetic island one last time, and wednesday we're driving out of townsville to make it to brizzy thursday and i fly away from the land of oz on sunday. wtf where did my time go??
incidently i can't wait to see everyone in europe :P but OMGz i don't want to leave!
<3
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment