We have done one of the top tourist attractions that our massive lonely planet book tells us to do in Sydney and that is to go to Manly. For once we picked the most perfect day to go, the sun was shining but it wasn't too hot.

We headed off early to Circular Quay to catch the Manly ferry, we even got seats outside. We had a great view of the Harbour Bridge, Opera House, Botanical Gardens, Double Bay, Rose Bay, Watsons Bay, Luna Park, Taronga zoo, a few of the harbour islands and finally Manly itself. I must admit most of the appeal of going to Manly is actually the ferry ride there and back. When you are nearly at Manly you turn away from Watsons Bay and you catch a glimpse of the vast Tasman Sea. It's the only thing that stands in the way of you swimming to New Zealand.

Manly beach itself is definably one of the prettiest beaches I have been to so far. It isn't as touristy as Bondi and about three times the size. The beach is lined with pine trees which just gives it a totally different look compared to all the Eastern Suburb beaches. The thing that struck me about Manly is its vastness, the beach is super duper long that it changes name halfway through but I can't remember the name??!! We had the obligatory plunge in the sea (which I am getting much more used to now), a lovely swim and some wave jumping. The waves where a tad on the large side but they were nowhere near as powerful as Bronte or Bondi.

To reward ourselves from fighting with the waves we had a cheeky Ben and Jerry ice cream......mmmmmm peanut butter ice cream YUMMY!! This is where Stu refused to kiss me for the rest of the day ha-ha! After we dried off we did the 1km walk to Shelly beach, its a bit like Bronte beach in the sense it is very family friendly with a lovely park at its rear. This beach was much more for me as there was not a wave n sight as Manly beach had protected us. This was the place to scuba dive as we saw hundreds of divers out at sea. After yet another dip in the water-which was actually a lot colder than Manly we trode along back to the ferry terminal where we caught a glimpse of good old Aldi. We had a quick shop then headed back onto the ferry. When I say ferry I don't mean the measly size of the Mersey ferry this ferry is HUGE!!

We relaxed in the sun shine as we floated back to Circular Quay where we were reunited with the Bridge and the Opera house before catching the bus (and maybe a cheeky sleep on the bus) back home to Bondi.

Good day all in all, definitely recommend the trip to Manly, was so picturesque....perfect!