After paying an arm and a leg yesterday for a bus into the city, this morning we decided to walk. It took about 45 minutes but it wasn't too hot so it was nice and easy. We walked up to the Opera House and took some pictures. The building needs some major refurbishment but as this will cost millions, the government in Sydney wont pay for it to be done. So as a consequence, it looking more and more tired each year.We then walked around the Botanical Gardens, by th...

We got the train back to the city yesterday and booked into our new hostel which we had booked because we had a "free night" voucher. When we were checking in aparantly the voucher had terms and we had to stay four nights to get the night free. We didn't budge and reluctently the receptionist gave us the deal.The district we are staying in is the main student area and reminds us of Camden Town in London, lots of bohemian shops and plenty of cafes and r...

We took a two hour double decker train (Tom was buzzing) from Sydney central station to Katoomba in the Blue Mountains (yes Alex, as you sarcastically highlighted they are Blue).We arrived at the "lodge" we'd booked into, stored the bags and quickly got onto a trail. The trails were mainly man-made footpaths but nice and easy to walk along. If there's one thing this country has, its great views, nothing like we've seen before. As we looked down the mass...

SYDNEY!!! We've long been waiting on our trip to Sydney, expecting it to be one of the highlights.Arriving sleep deprived doesn't always help but we landed at our hostel to find there was no room for us, even though we'd paid for the beds two days ago. We were forced to wait an hour or so until people started to leave (as it was 6 am when we arrived) and managed to get upgraded from a dorm to a twin room and we're only playing £19 for the night between us! Good ...

The brochure in the tourist information advertised Ballina as a stunning, quiet, upmarket, family resort so we thought we'd just make a visit to hang with the rich and waste 2 nights before we go onto Sydney.The place wasn't much like advertised (other than quiet and stunning in places) which wasn't such a bad thing as it meant we could save a little for our Sydney trip next.On the first day we made a short trip south and walked for about half an hour to the camp...