Sydney 2011 - Part II

DAY2

Well the whole week wasn't spent in the city only (though even if that's what we were limited to, it would be awesome as well ^^). The day after we arrived, we took a day trip/tour of the Blue Mountains - the beautiful mountain range about an hour inland of New South Wales. And you know what? They were actually sort of blue in color I thought hehehe (see the pics yourself and judge, don't take my word for it)...

The views were magnificent! Nature never seizes to amaze me :) We couldn't get enough of the blue skies - so surreal, it was unbelievably breathtaking! Fun fact, back in the days, early settlers thought that if you crossed the blue mountains, you would get to China! Hehehe...I have many other facts floating in my head but I shall not bore you with them :p Okok, last one - convicts sent to Australia were used as labor to carve paths across the blue mountain range - cool huh? (okay, so I think its cool :p)..anyhu, back to the mountains - breathtaking is how I can sum it up! I wonder what the locals who live around there think about the mountains - I mean to wake up with such a view in your backyard! Hehehe oh well, I think too much sometimes. This is what Zoe tells me and I think (I know :p) she is right hehehe :)

We took a cable car ride across the valley. There wasnt much time to actually go down to the valley floor and explore so we settled for the Skywalk. It wasn't bad - it was like a 5min cross with an incredible view of the valley. The cable car had a section where there was glass flooring that allows you to stand on it and see the valley below - cool! We passed the Katoomba Falls as well but sadly I could not get a good shot of the waterfall with the lens that I had on my camera. But Zoe managed a good shot - ironic how a compact digital camera manages to get better shots than my Nikon DSLR hehehe...I guess this means I gotta get a compact digital camera as well :p (I know all you DSLR folks are gonna scream and squirm at that sentence! hehehe :p) The alternative is to get the additional lenses for my DSLR but the thing is, professional lenses to cater for all types of shots will cost a bomb! (they can cost as much as my trip to Sydney! Go figure!)

Okay okay, back to my holiday...so after the Blue mountains we headed to the Featherdale Wildlife Reserve to see the Koalas and Kangaroos!! WooHoo! They are sooo cute and so did not look real at first :p I mean seriously, Zoe stumbled upon the Koala section and called to me to come see, the moment I looked at them on the trees, sleeping, I asked, 'Wait, these guys must be just the display dummy...' they were so still sitting on their perches and sleeping away! I had to concentrate real hard to look out for their breathing before I was convinced they were real! They were so adorable! I didn't manage to really see a Kangaroo (well like the ones I thought larr - big, orange, boxing gloves on their hands hahahaha :p) I saw a lot of Wombats, Wallabies (effing cute wei!!) and a bunch of other kangaroo-like marsupials hehehe...also, hmm, shud I mention this? Oh what the hell - we saw, 2 colorful macaws (or parrots - which ever species larr =\) going at it! It being = mating! Woot! (okay I sound like a perv :p) but it was hillarious max! We stood, watching laughing and took pictures - nature in action, it's good knowledge you know :p hehehe...we managed to catch the feeding of the cute little penguins as well. They were quite chosy for little tykes hehe. And they were each tagged with different colors to differentiate who they are and whom their mates are (penguins mate for life - everybody say 'awwwww...' aren't they just adorable??). Zoe managed to get a short video clip of them feeding - effing cute doesn't even cut it! :)

By the time we finished it was already close to sunset. Did I mention that the sun sets at around 5.20pm during early winter in Sydney. We got a shock (okay la not so larr) the 1st day we came. We were shopping away and by the time we came out it was dark and we kinduh stopped and looked at each other coz we thought were in the department store for just a short while hahaha...so we headed back towards the city after looking at the cute animals. And by the time we reached the hotel it was already 6.30pm and we had to rush to freshen up a little as we were supposed to meet up with a few of Zoe's friends for dinner at 7pm. And so being the efficient people (cheh wah...hehe) that we are, we managed to make it to Chinatown (which was a less than 5min walk from our hotel) with ample time. We had dinner at this Chinese skewer plc called Crazy Wings at Dixon St. where we had the yummiest lamb skewers ever! (so yummy that for 2 nites subsequent to that, we stopped and bought back just those skewers for some late night binging - oh yes we did!hahas). For dessert, we took a short walk towards Lindt Cafe (you read right ppl! Lindt the chocolatier has a cafe of their own!) located by Darling Harbor. We had yummy, hot chocolates and macaroons and just sat chatting away through the night...

To be continued...

xoxo