Saturday we set out to explore in depth a few of the neighborhoods in which we’re considering living. We walked through many of the streets, big and little, of Surry Hills, Darlinghurst and Paddington before taking the bus out to Coogee for our first trip to the beach. 
I think the debate about whether to live closer to the city or out at the beach had a decisive winner (closer to the city). It’s possible if we were making this decision during the non-winter season here it could have been different but the beach is far (relatively) from work and school and we would probably never want to go elsewhere on weekends. After doing the cliff walk along the ocean from Coogee to Bronte, we took the bus back to Surry Hills where we had dinner and found a bar to which the big rugby match (the Australians versus New Zealand…the Wallabies vs the All-Blacks). People got REALLY into it and it was fun to watch despite the fact that I have a very limited knowledge of rugby. It was also exciting to see what will hopefully be our new neighborhood in a couple weeks bustling at night. We had a very friendly New Zealander engage us in conversation after the match, of which 85% was him talking about how for a nation of 4 million people New Zealand is very good at sports (they lost that night to the Wallabies). I’m only guessing that’s what he was talking about for all that time based on the bits and pieces I was able to understand (add the heavy accent with a loud bar and my mild inability to hear and it creates a very large communication gap).
I think the debate about whether to live closer to the city or out at the beach had a decisive winner (closer to the city). It’s possible if we were making this decision during the non-winter season here it could have been different but the beach is far (relatively) from work and school and we would probably never want to go elsewhere on weekends. After doing the cliff walk along the ocean from Coogee to Bronte, we took the bus back to Surry Hills where we had dinner and found a bar to which the big rugby match (the Australians versus New Zealand…the Wallabies vs the All-Blacks). People got REALLY into it and it was fun to watch despite the fact that I have a very limited knowledge of rugby. It was also exciting to see what will hopefully be our new neighborhood in a couple weeks bustling at night. We had a very friendly New Zealander engage us in conversation after the match, of which 85% was him talking about how for a nation of 4 million people New Zealand is very good at sports (they lost that night to the Wallabies). I’m only guessing that’s what he was talking about for all that time based on the bits and pieces I was able to understand (add the heavy accent with a loud bar and my mild inability to hear and it creates a very large communication gap). 
Sunday we took the ferry across the harbour to the Taronga Park Zoo. I’m not usually all that excited about seeing animals in zoos (yeah, sure it’s a lion and that’s cool, but its locked up in a cage so who really cares?) but it was awesome to see some of the animals there. I probably haven’t been as excited to be at a zoo since I was like 4 years old or something. I understand that kangaroo are the deer-equivalent of Australia (for those people who have lived in NYC all their lives, seeing a deer is not really that exciting when you grew up with them coming into your backyard) but seeing them (kangaroos) right there in front of you was pretty exciting in my opinion! (The zoo staff must think its hilarious how the foreigners go crazy for the ‘roos). The koalas were adorable, so were the wallabies, I couldn’t get Elaine from Seinfeld saying “maybe the dingo ate your baby” out of my head when we were seeing the dingos. Overall a great zoo with some really cool animals and the setting is spectacular, up on the north shore of the harbour with views back to the city. As we were leaving a huge storm that had been on the horizon for quite some time caught up and dumped rain with lightning and booming thunder so the trip back home was a wet one.
Monday we did the opera house tour. The opera house is definitely an interesting structure and the main music hall inside is pretty impressive. Afterwards we went to the harbour bridge pylon lookout. This isn’t the bridge climb where you go to the top of the arch but instead go up about half as far to the top of one of the pylons. The view is pretty good and its about 20 times less expensive than the bridge climb (which I was all about doing until I just found out they don’t let you take cameras with you to the top, they instead take pictures of you and you have to buy them at I’m sure outrageous prices…what a crock). In the afternoon it started raining for about the 87th consecutive day (okay, we’ve been here for 7 days and plenty of them had no rain but it sure does seem like it rains a lot for a place that claims to be having a massive drought) and the news reported that Sydney experienced its coldest day in 5 years. I continue to regret not realizing that Sydney does actually have a chilly winter season and shorts and flip flops do not suffice in the month of July here. My warmer clothes are currently on a ship somewhere in the middle of the Pacific and will arrive well after the end of the winter weather I’m pretty sure. The news showed tons of children in the outer Sydney suburbs playing in the “snow” that fell last night (actually just a big hail storm but it stuck around long enough for people to use their boogie boards to sled down it and have hail-ball fights). Not necessarily the image that comes to mind when I think of Australia but everyone says that by mid-August the weather will warm up and it will become the Australia I’ve had in my mind.
For a whole slew of photos from these events follow this link:
