Sydney: an Unsuccessful Harbour Bridge Climb and Sensational Views

It's Sunday night, and I'm back from a lovely weekend in Sydney! Our plane took off at 10 am on Friday and we had brekkie (breakfast) at Gold Coast airport. We were lucky, because Bella and her parents have Virgin Gold Cards, which give you access to a lovely buffet in the business lounge.

Due to the fact that Sydney has daylight savings, we'd lost an extra hour. When we arrived at the hotel, we quickly checked in, put on good walking shoes and took a cab to the Sydney Harbour Bridge. Before we could actually climb the bridge, we first had to fill out some forms concerning health problems and received some necessary equipment. This included a big one-piece, rainproof pants, a harness and a headset through which you could hear the instructor. Once we'd put everything on, our harnesses were attached to the railing and we could start the bridge climb. Unfortunately, it already started drizzling after a few minutes, and after a while the drizzling turned into normal rain, which turned into a downpour. Mother Nature was, once again, conspiring against me...

We sought shelter at the nearest tower, and by this point we hadn't even started the actual climb yet. After having waited there for about 20 minutes, with no visible improvement regarding the weather, we were given the choice to a) go back and get a refund, or b) wait for another 20 minutes to see if the sky would clear up. Since we'd already made dinner reservations we decided to go back, and thus our bridge climb came to an end without setting foot on the steps of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.  

We went back to the hotel, got changed and had some tapas at a little tapas bar nearby. We had a few small dishes including olives, prosciutto and baguette with green beans and goat cheese. Afterwards, we walked (in the rain...) to the restaurant where we'd made reservations, and had dinner there. While I was enjoying my delightful lamb dish with zucchini and potatoes, I had a lovely view over the harbour and the Opera House. Well actually, that was after an enormous cruise ship (which had been blocking my view for half an hour) had finally left. After dinner we walked back to the hotel and went to bed early.

The following morning we got up quite early, had breakfast at the hotel and took a cab to a shopping street. Bella tried on some dresses for her Formal, but I didn't buy anything because everything there was very expensive. Bella, Kaia and I then took another cab to a shopping mall called Westfield, and I bought a long black dress (see photo) and two tops. We had lunch at the shopping mall and spent the rest of the afternoon there. We also bought some presents for family friends where we'd have dinner that night. When we got tired of shopping, we headed back to the hotel, had a shower and got dressed for dinner at the Screncis (family friends). Paula, the mum, is Dutch but moved to Australia when she was 23. It was nice talking Dutch again to someone besides Do, but at the same time a bit weird because she had such an Australian accent. We'd also invited Colette (another Dutch exchange) and her host Caitlin over for dinner and it was really good catching up with them. We had a lovely night and the view from the terrace was truly astonishing.

Today, we slept in till about 11 am and then rushed to the harbour to be in time for the ferry. On our way there, we quickly grabbed breakfast at Starbucks (very Australian, not...) The ferry took us all around the Sydney Harbour, and of course, being a typical tourist, I took some photos with the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge in the background. We also came across Luna Park, a very old and famous amusement park in Sydney. When we got off the ferry, Bella's parents went back to the hotel and Bella and I just walked around for a bit and took some more photos. 

Back at the hotel, we packed our bags, checked out and took a cab to the airport. Our flight was scheduled for 16:00, but we arrived at the airport at 14:15 so we managed to get on to an earlier flight and left at 15:00. The rest of the day was a bit uneventful, I just unpacked my bag, watched some series and right now I'm about to publish this blog update. I'm quite tired as well so I think I'm going to bed early today and have a lovely long sleep. Night! X