We took the ferry to Manly first thing in the morning
Gonna go surfin, surfin USA... nope not USA, try Manly Beach in Australia
We got some great views of the skyline, bridge, and opera house on the ferry ride back to Sydney
A real close up of the water side of the opera house
The unbelievable view from Macquaries Chair in the Botanical Gardens
It only took us seven shots to get it right... love the long arm!
Boo yea, about to climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge
And here we are on our way up the east side of the bridge in our lovely bridge climbing suits - what a view!
A little posing action from those crazy Texan girls
This was our climbing guide Mike giving us our climbing certificates and group photo
Mike recommended the Lord Nelson Hotel (Sydney's oldest hotel) for the first stop on our evening pub crawl - the place felt reminiscent of Germany and was packed out with great character, good beer, and $6 meat pies
Next stop on the pub crawl was Fortune of War, Sydney's oldest pub
After a flurry of spontaneity, we headed to Three Wise Monkeys more centrally located in the city
Monday morning began with breakfast at our usual shop (usual after two days!), the Baker's Oven Cafe. We took the ferry to Manly (a 30 minute ride) and walked through the main street of Corso and along the beach. It reminded me of all our cathedral viewing in Europe where after a while, it's just another cathedral. It felt like just another beach. I think in the heat of summer, it would've been great to splash through the waters. We headed back to the city and out to Macquarie's Chair in the botanical gardens, which is renowned for its amazing view of both the opera house and harbour bridge. After ripping down George St (the main shopping drag), we headed towards the bridge. We had an appointment to climb the bridge at 2:45pm! We found the entrance to the bridge climb, had lunch at a nearby pub, and returned to do the climb.
I was a little reluctant to do the climb given it's considerable expense but Katie really wanted to do it, and I'm so glad we did. Our experience was tremendous. It's a 3.5 hour deal from beginning to end. We got issued all our equipment and got suited up with more gear than I expected - bridge suits, wind pants, jackets, hats, handkerchiefs, cable guides, headsets, headlamps, radios, and a safety belt/harness (off of which everything hangs). We did a 'practice climb' up the ladders and gangway inside, then headed out for the real deal. We elected to the bridge climb in early twilight, meaning we climbed the east side of the bridge in daylight, and got to the crest of the bridge just as the sun began to set. Our guide Mike was wonderful. He got right into the photo shoots giving we crazy Texan girls plenty of time to plan our poses and prepare for the shoot. Yes, we did manage to add a little fun to every tour we did. Shocking. He also let us stand around at the top of the bridge for about 10-15 minutes and just take in the spectacular sunset. We were privileged to have a really rare and beautiful sunset with brilliant colors that deepened in intensity by the second, blazing beautiful hues of burning red, fluorescent orange, and a purple haze. We weren't allowed to bring anything with us on the climb, so unfortunately, the only two photos we have up there were purchased, but the experience was incredible. I loved being in the bridge, looking and learning about the design of it, and seeing it from so many different angles. It took 8 years to build with around 1500 people were working on it at any given time (coincidentally the number of steps we took that day to climb the bridge). There are 6 million steel rivets in the bridge. Like the Opera House, they completely blew the budget during construction. Lesson learned here is that if I blow the budget on a project, it has potential to become a big iconic structure.
After the exhilarating climb, upon Mike's prompting, we headed to Lord Nelson's Hotel on Argyle St, which claimed to be Sydney's oldest hotel. We enjoyed a couple beers and a super cheap $6 meat pie dinner. Very Aussie. The next stop along our pub crawl was Fortune of War, which claimed to be Sydney's oldest pub (okay...hotel/pub distinction). About 10 minutes before we were planning to pick up our bags from the hotel and head to the airport, we decided we weren't quite ready to bid Sydney farewell. We were having too much fun and decided we needed another day. In a flurry of excitement and spontaneity, we changed our flights and booked our hotel for an extra night. The continuation of our pub tour took us further down George St into the city to Three Wise Monkeys then Scruffy Murphy's, Sydney's #1 Irish pub. We sure did hit all the highlights and had a really fun night of dancing and live music.
