We left Adelaide and arrived in Sydney on July 7th. When we first landed it was pretty darn cold. Although, since Ariana left Texas about a week and a half ago in 100 degree weather the cold is still a shock. But it has been cold but not Northern States cold. More like in the 50's and 60's but the wind can be cold on the Harbour and next to the ocean. We arrived in the evening and it was a bit of a struggle getting from the airport and checked into our hostel. But we managed. We are staying at Eva's Backpackers in Kings Cross. Most of the hostels in the city are in this area and it's actually known as being the red light district of Sydney. However, we are staying off on a side street and haven't really had to encounter and strange activity in our area. There could be stuff but every day we come back to the hostel we are pretty exhausted and go to bed around 10-11 and last night 9 pm haha. Our first night we were really hungry after getting situated so we walked down the street to a little Italian take away restaurant. Man was I happy to see the price here. All dinner entrees were 9.90$ that is like cheap as chips in Australia! Everyone says Sydney is expensive and don't get me wrong it definitely is. But there are many cheap food options available to find. This is good when you're on a budget.

On Wednesday, we went over to Darling Harbour. We walked because according to my GPS it didn't seem far. But it took nearly 40 minutes to get there so we did a lot of walking. A few days ago we had ordered a bunch of groupons and one of them being an Iventure pass. You pay 70$, usually 100$, and you get to pick 3 attractions to do in the city. We went to Darling Harbour to get our passes situated. Then we walked over to the Rocks, the area next to Circular Quay, where the opera house and bridge are located. We met up for lunch with Kaylee and her family who were also in Sydney for one more day before heading to New Zealand. It was really nice to meet her family but really sad to say goodbye to Kaylee as we had spent so much time together. But I know we will see each other again in the future and Minnesota isn't so far away J after lunch and walking around the Rocks, a historical district with cute cafes and lots of stores. Then Ariana and I headed over to Circular Quay to see the opera house. We decided to use our first Iventure pass for a tour inside the Opera House. We arrived at the Opera house and got our ticket for the next available tour which was at 2:30. For the tour, they gave us a headset and radio so the tour guide could speak to us over that. I learned so much about the Opera House I definitely wouldn't have known otherwise. One of the most surprising things was the design was by a Danish architect which brought so many memories back to when I toured the Danish Opera House in Copenhagen with Danni's family. The Opera house really is an incredibly stunning building that took 16 years to build and they expected it to take only 3 years costing 7 million dollars. Of course it actually costed about 100 million dollars. The Opera house design is quite modern for when it was designed in the 1950's. It has over 1 million tiles priced at 500$ a tile on the outside. Inside the Opera house are 5 theaters all very unique and different to one another. My favorite was where the orchestra and Symphony play where the background of the stage housed an organ made of 10,000+ pieces. Overall I just love the Opera house and the architecture is just simply stunning. I have so many pictures of it from many angles I just can't get enough of the building.

After touring the Opera House we went back to the area where our hostel is located where we went to a pub for 10$ steaks. It was great to have a steak again but it just doesn't compare to back home. Once back at our hostel we started talking about activities we wanted to do. I knew Ariana really wanted to climb the Harbour Bridge and I really wanted to as well. Many people had told me it was expensive and that's why they hadn't done it. I knew it would be really a once in a lifetime experience to climb the Sydney Harbour bridge. So I decided I was able to make it work so we booked the climb for the next day (Thursday) and we booked it for at night. It would provide a unique experience to see the city skyline at night from a view that most people can't get at night because all the lookouts are closed. I couldn't believe I had booked the bridge climb and that it would actually be happening the next day. We were both very excited. I knew I had also really wanted to visit the Blue Mountains about 1.5 hours outside of Sydney. We booked a tour for Saturday to spend the day at the Blue Mountains.

On Thursday, we decided to use our second IVenture pass for the Sydney Tower Eye, the tallest building in Sydney. When we arrived we got our ticket but she said we could get 50% off to do the Skywalk. The Skywalk is basically a walk around the outside of the tower at almost the tallest point where you can touch the letters and view Sydney from 80+ kilometers outside the city. We decided why not and it was a great deal! She booked us on the next available Skywalk. We rode up into the tower which took 45 seconds to make it to the top. We stepped out of the elevator and saw the stunning views all around us of the city of Sydney. It was really amazing to be in the tallest building looking down and recognizing different sites that we had been to already. When it came time to line up for the Skywalk she gave us blue/grey suits to wear over our clothes. There were about 12 people in our group to go up an extra two levels to be the select people at the highest point in Sydney at that moment. Our guide gave us harnesses to wear around our waist where it attached to a metal rim so we would be attached at all times so no one could jump off or have anything happen. It was quite funny having everyone attached to metal moving our pieces from the harness around the rim. It was basically like we were a "chain gang" walking around the tower and viewing the sites. I really loved the Skywalk it was incredible to view and to see all around. Our guide pointed out different areas of Sydney and we got to touch the letters on the top of the tower "Westfield" as it is called. I touched the W, e, and s so every time I see the tower I think I touched those! And you can see the tower everywhere you go so I think it to myself quite frequently. Then our guide set up a photo shoot for us so she would take pictures for us. The pictures were actually really fun. We did jumping pictures on the see-through platform and they just look so fun. I really enjoyed this experience and would highly recommend it to everyone.

After the Sydney tower we took the train to Luna Park which is an amusement park just across the harbor bridge. We went there to get a different view of the opera house and bridge and just to take in the sights of the harbor. Then we walked across the harbor bridge which took about 20 minutes to get across to the area known as the rocks. We had some ice cream from Royal Copenhagen (my favorite ice cream shop). Then we got ready for our bridgeclimb on the harbor bridge. When we arrived in the shop where we would depart on the journey it looked like an airport hangar but it was directly under where the bridge begins so thousands of cars were driving just above us. Our time for the excursion was at 4:35 and the entire process including climb takes about 3.5 hours. Most of the time is actually due to the pre-climb and the process of getting ready to climb the bridge. We were really excited! There were about 12 other people in our group. This was one of the most organized excursions I've ever taken part of and heaps of celebrities have taken part in bridgeclimb. They have many pictures of the famous faces all over the walls that completed bridgeclimb. Once we were called for our time we were let into a room with benches where we basically had to sign our life away in case anything happened (luckily it's basically the safest thing I've ever participated in). Then they had us move into the next room where all of us had a personal dot to stand on. Then we were given our bridge climb suits to dress into over our clothes. The next room was full of changing curtains where we were told to put the suits on. Once the suits are on you have to go through a metal detector to make sure there is no metal whatsoever on your body. (If something were to drop it would cause serious damage from so high up). After the metal detector we walked into another room where we were told to stand on a personal dot and given our harnesses to wrap around our waist. Once the harness was on we made our way to the next location which was a practice bridge climb to prepare us for the activity. The practice one was basically 2 steep ladders to climb up and 2 steep ladders to climb down. It was a direct imitation of one part of the bridge climb and our harnesses also had the metal clip to attach us to the railing. After the practice bridge climb we were given lots of supplies for the journey. Since its winter and at night we were given a beanie, gloves, a jacket, and a hankie. Each supply had a clip on it that was meant to clip somewhere on our suit so nothing could have the possibility to fall. We were just about ready to go into battle (or as it seemed with all these attachments haha). Next step was getting a radio hooked up to us. The radio is awesome as since the bridge is massive and they space us out while climbing it allows the tour guide to speak so all of us can hear. It's great! After the radio, we were finally able to make our way to the actual bridgeclimb. Ariana and I were towards the back of the group so we attached our harnesses through the metal clip and set off on the walk under the road of cars and towards the bridge entry. We were walking on suspended metal paths under the road leading up to the pylons. Once at the pylons we climbed 4 sets of the steep ladders similar to the practice set. Once at the lowest part of the actual bridge (where the arch begins) we had our first picture taken. Then we set off on the many steps (which were surprisingly not steep at all, but there were many of them). We took in all the sites around us as we made our way towards the top of the arch. It was just incredible and amazing and basically any adjective with beautiful is how I would describe the experience. When we made it to the halfway point on the arch we stopped for another photo op with the opera house lit up in the background (this is the photo I kept). Just beautiful and such a unique experience as any other view at night for this would essentially be closed. So it was spectacularly unique and simply incredible. We made our final decent to the tip top of the arch where we were even with the flags displayed at the top. At this time it was the Australian flag and the Aboriginal flag. We stood between the two flags for an awesome view and satisfaction of being at the top and in the middle of the bridge looking down at rush hour traffic below us 160 meters. For the next bit we walked along the top of the bridge, and had a group photo and just took in the sites of this once in a lifetime experience with all its beauty. Then we headed back down to the halfway point where Ariana and I recorded a video for our families and took a picture (which Ariana kept this one) of the city of Sydney all lit up. Then we made our final descent back down the arch and into the pylons where the journey came to a close. I really didn't think I would have the opportunity to do bride climb but I'm really really glad that I did. It was an incredible experience and I hope others will consider doing it the experience really outweighs the cost.

On Friday, we had our whale watching adventure. I had found a groupon about a month in advance as about 75% off the original cost and its whale watching season so I jumped on it. The whale watching would depart from Darling Harbour which is opposite from where the harbor bridge and opera house are located. The boat ended up having probably 50-60 people. But it was a COLD morning and with the extra wind we were definitely chilly. The experience in total lasted about 4 hours. An hour going out to sea, about 2 hours looking for whales, and the rest of the time was our journey back to darling harbor. Once out of the harbor and in the sea we spotted the first spout of water into the air from not too far a distance. The boat chased down the whale and we road next to it. The whale was a male humpback on the hunt for a female moving rather quickly. He would travel under water for about 5 minutes before coming up for air for 3 spouts of water. This was the interval that we watched for over the next 30 minutes. It was amazing the first time seeing the humpback whale from up close. He was beautiful! Then Ariana spotted a bunch of splashing in the distance and when she told me to look we both saw a whale jump out of the water and slam down. It was spectacular! Then the boat noticed and we began to make our decent towards where the whale was splashing. There was an excessive amount of splashing though so we realized it looked like multiple whales were there. Turns out it was two male humpback whales showing off to win over the female whales. So they were splashing to show their strength and dominance. Once we got closer we noticed two more whales further out who were the females and we were able to see them from up close moving in and out of the water to blow out water. It was a great experience just very cold out on the water with the wind. So glad we got to see such great activity coming from the whales.

Later on Friday, we went through to the Fish Market where there was so much variety of seafood I had ever seen. From King crabs, to blue crabs, to eel, to mussels and clams, to sea urchin. Ariana joked that there would be lots of Asian people and there literally were. Many of the signs were even in Chinese so I think it is a popular destination for people from Asian to come and eat/buy seafood. Then we made our way over to Chinatown over by Central Sydney. There really wasn't much of a Chinatown but we did get to walk around a new area for a bit before deciding to go into a pub. We ordered sangria for us to share and later on a guy from Los Angeles hit up the pokies and won 6,000$ so he bought us some cider for his celebratory win. Lucky duck. Then we decided to eat around the supposed Chinatown district and agreed on Korean BBQ. I had had it once before in Adelaide but it was super expensive so I didn't think I would eat it again. But this place was great we got marinated chicken and beef and cooked it for ourselves with lots of side dishes and rice. It was a great experience to cook our own food.

On Saturday, we went to the Blue Mountains about 1.5 hours outside of Sydney. We booked a group tour where we were picked up from our hostel at 7:45 am. It took a little over an hour for us to pick up everyone on the tour. The tour was around 22 people. Our first stop was at Sydney Olympic Park home to the 2000 Olympic Games. We weren't able to see to much as it was foggy and we didn't have the time to tour the hundreds of acres. We saw the ANZ stadium where the opening games took place. Our next stop was at the Parramatta River, where much of the water in Sydney comes from. We had a snack break and then it was off to the Blue Mountains. The Blue Mountains National Park is quite large and many people live in the area in small towns. We drove about 45 minutes into the park to reach our destination. Our first stop was a look out into the main and most scenic valley. It is called the Blue Mountains because of the millions of Eucalyptus trees in the area that produce a blue haze over the mountains hence the name. The lookout was amazing just spanning the valley and just so much beauty in the area. Our next point was another lookout with a short bushwalk to a waterfall. The waterfall was humongous. Spanning from the top of the plateau all the way down to the bottom where the water was collected. We then went to a small town I think called Lorne. Where we ate our picnic lunch and walked around the one street town looking at the different shops. Once back on board the bus we headed to Scenic World. Scenic world is 3 different attractions of Katoomba (home of the 3 sisters and most well-known part of the Blue Mountains). There is a skyway to take you across from one side of the mountain to the other with views of another large waterfall and the 3 sisters. Once across on the skyway there are two attractions to take you down into the valley to walk along forest in the valley. We took the cableway down into the valley catching glimpses of the 3 sisters. Once in the valley we did some walking along the boardwalks they have built. The valley use to be a transport for miners of coal where they would dig within the area and transport it back up to the top. To do this they used the steepest railway in the world to transport the coal up and down. We actually got to ride in the railway and it was essentially a straight 180 degree angle up to the top where we caught the cableway down. It was my favorite part of scenic world because it is so steep. The Blue Mountains were stunning and they have so much history among them from the earliest aboriginal people who took care of the land. To the white settlers who took a journey across in hopes of new farmland. It's quite a sad history of what happened to the Aboriginals in the Blue Mountains where the people were nearly wiped out of the area.

On Sunday, we took the ferry across Sydney Harbour about 30 minutes to Manly Beach. A beautiful beach on the other side of Sydney harbor. We decided to use our last iventure for bike rentals at the beach. Now riding a bike in Australia is actually quite scary. There are no bike lanes and you can't ride on the sidewalks. So it was quite scary on the roads. Felt like we were going to get hit a few times and the fact we didn't know where we were going was quite scary. It is also law to wear a helmet or you face a hefty fine. Eventually we did fine the actual beach of Manly beach where we were able to ride our bikes up and down the beach on the sidewalk. The beach was stunning! So blue and clear with gorgeous soft sand. The bikes really didn't go so well. We returned them early because there weren't many places we felt comfortable riding them other than the beach. One because it was super hilly and we were afraid of the cars. After we returned the bikes we went on a walking trail along Manly beach to Shelly beach for some great views of the city of Manly. That evening, we went to Darling Harbour where we had reservations for this nice restaurant I got a groupon for. It was a fancy Italian restaurant right on the water of Darling Harbour. Little did we know you didn't get much choice of what you get. It was a cocktail with a matched dessert or entrée (appetizer). You couldn't mix or match either. I ordered an opera house dessert and a brandy that was supposed to be filled with walnut syrup and cream. This duo was 35$ and it was YUCK! The cake was plain and not much flavor and the brandy was way too strong. It tasted like straight up alcohol instead of something to compliment the dessert. So we ended up eating our desserts and not finishing the drinks while we headed back to our hostel stopping for a real dinner of Thai food.

On Monday, it was time to set off on our second week of traveling to the East Coast of Queensland. Unfortunately, our checkout time for the hostel was 10am and our flight didn't leave till 5:30. So since we had luggage we decided to spend the day in the airport. It wasn't so bad though. We both felt time had passed pretty quickly. Then we were off to Townsville! Where it was about 20 degrees warmer than Sydney and basically a cool summer rather than winter.