Our first trip to Australia had to include Sydney. It is famous for its opera house, the harbour bridge, the beaches and the 2000 Olympics. It is about the same size as Melbourne which we visited a couple of weeks ago, and it is often compared to its rival city. We constantly were thinking about the differences and similarities between the two as we explored Sydney.
Melbourne seemed to be a bit more gritty and had a lot more of a music and arts scene. Sydney is more of a picturesque city built around it’s iconic harbour views. Both cities have great food, decent transit, and some great parks and museums. We really could stay in either city for a much longer stay, but I slightly preferred Melbourne. It could have been the neighborhood we stayed in Melbourne that may have swayed our feelings. In Sydney, we had an Airbnb close in to the city but it just seemed like we had to walk a ways to get to transit or restaurants. We did have a local neighborhood pub that we really have to expect in Australian cities. We are big fans of the Australian pub!
Sydney has a lot of great walks and lots of the walking can be combined with ferry trips to make some really fantastic routes. We are still slowed a bit by Meg’s crutches but were able to see quite a few of Sydney’s sights. I did my customary “free city walk” the first day and then took Meg on a shorter city walk so she could also see the big attractions. One day we took a ferry to Manly beach, one day we walked the botanical garden and saw an art museum, and one day we visited a natural history museum.
After a few days of Australian city life, we were ready to get back into nature. The Blue Mountains are just a 2 hour drive from Sydney and we had booked 3 nights in the small tourist town of Katoomba. The mountains are famous for the blue color that appears when looking at the far away eucalyptus trees through the humid mountain air. It is also famous for the fog and rain clouds that can hang around for a few days and make it very difficult to see the blue mountain views. Luckily we had some pretty good weather for our first 2 days. The lookouts were easy to get to and really brought back feelings of seeing the Grand Canyon or Yosemite. The views from the cliffside were breathtaking, and way better to see them in person than I was anticipating. I had seen pictures beforehand, and took quite a few of my own pictures, but they really can’t show how it looks in real life. We did a few cliff hikes but also drove around quite a bit in our rental car to see different views of the cliffs. It was also nice to hang out in some Australian towns instead of just seeing the big city.
Sydney for 5 nights and Blue Mountains for 3 nights went fast but we were ready to move on and want to see a different side of Australia. We are now heading to our 4th Australian state- Southern Australia and will be staying a week in the city of Adelaide. See ya to Sydney and G’Day Adelaide!!!!