Our Sydney Adventure

You won't believe this but since Aaron has been in Australia we haven't once been downtown. So last Saturday we decided to plan the best day ever. It would start in the city and end at Bondi beach drinking my favourite Iced Chocolate.

We headed into the city at about 11am and went straight to paddy's market. If you don't know what that is, it's a market full of things you don't need but buy anyway cuz their so darn cheap. Nah.. it's a pretty fun place if you have the time and money but Aaron and I where on a tight schedule. We headed above paddy's to a shopping centre (mall) and goof around.

This is Aaron in a shop window posing with the over sized koala bear. He wants to add it to his over sized Australian stuffed animal collection (I'm sure Corbyn and Kinzie will find a way to get on this one and drag each other across the tile).

After Chinatown we walked to Darling Harbour and along the way found fountains, lots of water, a playground and even a magician.

I found this the perfect place to stop for my daily meditation session. Although Aaron had a different idea of meditation.

Aaron, like every child, started getting tired so I had to stop and let him play for a while.

I just wanted an excuse to get wet because it was 33 degrees (Celsius) and I was HOT! But, the joke was on me after Aaron took about a minute to take a photo and I was left soaked.








You can find lots of random things and people on the streets of Sydney. The key is to get close enough to get a good picture but not too close so that they notice you and go out of their way to join you in on the show so they can get a few guilt coins off of you. I (Aaron) am good at that.

After all this walking we needed to eat. Aaron was so excited he made me take a photo of his food. He wanted everyone to know what his favourite sandwich from Australia is. It's Ham, Cheese and pineapple toasted on Turkish Bread. Now if you haven't ever tasted this bread, you haven't lived. It is so YUMMY!

I know it doesn't look that appealing but if your into pineapple on a sandwich you will love this one.

Now every little kid loves the Aquarium and I, Aaron (I'm taking over the blog from Teana. She's tired.), am no exception. Teana's idea of a day out is hitting up the beach and the little cafes and smoothie shops. I like that but being a nerd I'd rather take a book to the beach or build a huge sandcastle or, on this day, go to an aquarium or museum. I was hoping for the second but I settled for the first. Off we went to the Sydney Aquarium where little Nemo himself lives. (I actually was highly disappointed that it really wasn't Nemo but a fish of his species. Evidently it's inhumane to clip one of a fishes fins to replicate an computer animated character even if it is the mother of all animated studios, Pixar... free plug). I digress... here's the adventures of the day.

Now I believe in safety precautions but I don't think that this graphic portrayal of stick death is something a children's aquarium should be promoting. Why don't they go ahead and add a sign next to it that says the following sign might traumatize your child (or me) for life. There is no humor in that. They need to take that down... and give it to me for my wall. (the real funny thing was that if I remember correct the fall was only about 2 stories, who's that going to kill?






Children, this is a giant sea turtle. Neat.

This is the shark area. Ever since I was a little kids (2nd grade) I've had a desire to swim with sharks. I think that is why God gave me Asthma. Asthmatics aren't aloud to scuba dive so I'll probably never get to jump right down in the water with them. I'm still trying to figure out a way to perhaps go to a 3rd world country and slip through those liability sheets and do it but until then I guess the scary looking but not so threatening nurse sharks through a layer of thick glass will have to do. The truth is I only have one pick and it's not that good.

That I believe is an angel shark. It pretty much just sucks stuff off the floor. Very interesting.








And there's a giant Sting Ray. The sharks were too fast to get a pic of but it was one of those tunnel things where you see all around so it was pretty cool.








I'd just like to take a moment to remind people the liberal world we live and that not only is it liberal but has horrible awareness advertising campaigns. First off, don't put this one right outside an aquarium, not quite your target market. Secondly, I can think of a whole lot of other adds that would be far more effective in getting the message across with less ability to be misperceived. I'm starting to wonder if UNICEF actually employs professional marketers. Glad to see that the US tax dollars that go to the UN are going to good use... the good ol' UN never fails us.

Downtown Sydney is probably roughly half the size of Manhattan (total guess) but a lot bigger than most downtown areas I've been to. We happened to be on one side of downtown and wanted to hit up the opera house for good times sake and decided to walk roughly 3 miles in flip flops to the Opera House an botanical gardens. It wasn't too fun but we did soak up Sydney life and have a nice rest in the beautiful botanical gardens with a not too shabby view.

I decided to add to my portfolio of Opera House pictures... I think I now have 3 or 4. I find that after you've been once the aww tends to wear off a bit.

I feel bad putting the Opera House on there and not including his little buddy the Sydney Harbor (or Harbour as they say in Oz) Bridge.

After 6 miles of walking and the needed rest in between the day in the city and the beach turned out, much to my wife's dismay, to only be a day in the city. So this is what Teana and I felt and looked like by the end of our fun but extremely tiring adventure in the city. Luckily I got the role of taking the pic and not being in it. So much for my last trip to the big city for who knows how many years.