A Merry Sydney Christmas

Well, today was our last in Sydney. We've had a busy couple of days exploring the city and we're ready to go home and put our feet up!!! Today we had breakfast down at Darling Harbour and mooched around the shops. We came across 'The Great British Lolly Shop' so stocked up on mint humbugs, licquorice torpedos and rhubarb and custards for the flight home!

We landed back at Brisbane at 3pm, after a Merry Sydney Christmas.

Tourists in Sydney

Today we slept in late...8am is late for us! Once we were up and out we met some friends in Darling Harbour for breakfast. Kevin and I used to work with Rachel at Southampton General. Next to Rachel in the above photo is her fiance Dave and her brother Richard. It was great to catch up.

After breakfast we walked to the Sydney tower where we were sent up in a lift taking 40 seconds to reach 250 metres to the observation deck. The 360 degree views were great! This is when we got our first glimpse of Sydneys icons, the Opera House and Harbour bridge.

After our visit to the Sydney tower we walked the route to circular key to get close up views of the bridge and the Opera house.

I know it's a bit of a cliche, but the Opera house really does take your breath way at first sight...it's spectacular soaring shell-like exterior is a must see! The architecture is amazing.

By the time we got here, we were pretty tired, as we had done a fair bit of walking today! So, it was a trip back to Darling Harbour on one of the numerous ferries from Circular quay for a yummy italian dinner!

Sydney day 2.....we're all in this together....

Today we did a bit more exploring around Darling Harbour and had a visit to The Maritime Museum. We also climbed aboard 'Endeavour' a replica of the ship which Captain James Cook sailed on for 3 years. Grace and Anna thoroughly enjoyed this as they have both learnt all about Cook and other explorers at school this year.

After a coffee (or hot chocolate in my case!) at Starbucks we went along to the Capitol Theatre to see High School Musical. This was booked several months ago when we first planned our trip to Syney, but we only told the girls about it last night as we walked past the theatre on the way to our hotel last night!

This was the stage curtain

And the grand finale where you weren't supposed to take photos....oops, how did I get this then?

It was a fantastic show....even Kevin enjoyed it!!

Darling Harbour

After an 'eat as much as you like' buffet in Pizza hut, we took our suitcases to the hotel and then went to walk off our 'Christmas dinner'. It's such fun exploring a new place. We were suprised to find that Darling Harbour was just a short walk from our hotel. The place was buzzing with activity.

Here is the Christmas tree at Darling Harbour:

And here is the Sydney tower (wonder if it's as good as the Auckland one??)

Christmas dinner in Sydney

We landed in Sydney at 5pm today and were transported to the city centre by taxi to an italian restaurant which we'd booked back in August for a nice Christmas dinner (even if it was to be pizza and pasta!) Unfortunately when we got there it was closed!!!! Not quite sure why, particularly as we had email confirmation of our booking prior to leaving Brisbane this morning!!

Anyway, we weren't going to let it ruin our day......we walked around the corner with our suitcases on wheels and found a Pizza Hut. So, this is where we had Christmas dinner 2008, in Pizza Hut, Chinatown, Sydney!!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Christmas arrived in Brisbane very early today as Anna woke at 4.59am! It is a hot day, and the sun was shining in through her window very warmly, but it was the excitement of the day ahead that really woke her I'm sure!


We are flying to Sydney this afternoon for a 3 day break. The girls have only found out in the last couple of days although we booked the trip back in July!! We've managed to keep it a secret until a few days ago and I'm glad we spilt the beans as it was so hard trying to get organised!

Merry Christmas and Blessings for the new year ahead, from a hot and sticky Brisbane!

Carols in the park

Today was Carols in the park at our local park. We turned up with our folding chairs, esky (cool box!) holding wine and beers and nibbles, and had a lovely relaxing evening. We sat and listened to all the local school choirs singing, soloists singing carols and there was candy floss stalls, pizza, hot dogs, Santa, reindeer etc.

Check out the beautiful sunset!

Queensland thunderstorms

They're big!!! They are also scary! In the three years we have been here, we've only had to suffer these hailstones 2 or 3 times. You don't go out in them, you hide indoors!! They hurt! They also dent cars, rip bushes and branches from trees and are extremely noisy on the roof!

We have been fortunate where we live not to suffer any great damage unlike many across the city over the last few weeks who have had major damage to their homes by lightning and heavy rain.

Our car took a good battering this evening though: