First Day in Sydney

On Wednesday morning, my parents drove us to the airport. We hugged and kissed Desmond goodbye and set off for somewhere new. Two connections, one lay over, and a dozen hours of audiobook later, we had made it to Sydney Australia! 

Having crossed the dateline, we arrived early Friday morning. We had filled out all our customs information and uploaded a number of documents prior to traveling, so customs was a breeze. Three checkpoints, (two of them self-serve) and absolutely no waiting. We looked at the line for those who had not done the electronic customs and were grateful for the effort we had put in up front.

After gathering our baggage, we headed to the Airport train to make our way to the hotel. Standing on the train, still wearing our N-95 masks that we’d been in (off and on) for the better part of 24 hours now, I noticed that though there were signs indicating fees for those who did not wear masks on public transit, we were in the minority by complying with this regulation. While we enjoyed just being upright, we began to see a bit of Sydney out the window as the train went from underground to elevated and back again. 


Seeing ferns and grasses growing on the tracks, I made a mental note to share with Desmond that I had seen tracks that looked like those in the picture book The Curious Garden. 

I also spied the famous opera house. In the past, we have come up out of whichever subway station we are in on the wrong side so often it has become quite a joke how laughably bad we are at exiting subway systems. This time, I looked at the map, made my best guess, and to our extreme surprise, we came out right. 

We walked to our hotel, planning to stow our bags and take the required COVID tests before our long wait to check in. When we asked about stashing our bags we were delighted to find that they had a room available for us immediately, seven hours before our expected check in time! Praise Jesus!  This was an answer to prayer and way beyond what I had hoped or imagined. 

We went up to our room, I got out a set of our free home COVID tests and we happily complied with the quick “quarantine” mandated by the province while we awaited our rapid antigen test results. Once those negative results showed up, we showered and got ready for our day. 

Freshened up and feeling much better for it, we set out to explore. Bryan looked at a map and pointed us in the direction of some green spots on it, near the water.  We kept telling each other “Hey! We’re in Australia.” or “I’ve never been here before!” It is so fun to go somewhere new. 

Bryan noticed that the cars drive on the left side of the street here. Initially I brushed this off as unimportant as we would not be driving a car. Then I reminded myself that this means we need to check the opposite ways before crossing streets. No problem, we can remember that, I thought. Frequently, I would look up and notice that people were coming directly at us, and would move to the left to get out of their way even though they were walking on the wrong side… my jet lagged brain stopped and revised this statement. In many countries, pedestrians tend to follow a similar flow as traffic, and so it is here. We found ourselves many times throughout the day swimming upstream, as it were, by unconsciously staying to the right. 

No sooner had we arrived at the park area but I began seeing big birds I had not seen before and didn’t know the name of. They were loud and had prominent curved beaks, and stood on one foot when they rested. I have since found out that these are Australian White Ibis, and considered pests. But they were so novel and big that they made me giggle, and Bryan took my picture with one. 

We continued to walk through the park, noting the big trees and tropical plants, until the path went down by the water of the bay. Overhead flew a large white parrot and I was completely giddy. I exclaimed to Bryan about it, that here it was, just out of doors, not in a pet store cage or a aviary or anything!  I was fairly confident that it was a cockatoo and I was right. A quick visit to the Australian Geographic website later at the hotel taught me that they are Sulfur-crested Cockatoos. 

As we rounded a corner, just up the hill from a sign urging people not to feed the birds, was a woman sitting on the ground surrounded by probably 20 of these cockatoos - feeding them and letting them land all over her.  I was reminded of the “Feed the Birds” song from Mary Poppins. My eyes about bugged out of my head at the number of them all. 

We made it down to a point called Miss MacQuarrie’s Chair and looked down and out over the bay and the iconic Sydney Opera House.  We took many pictures of the opera house, since it is so recognizably Australia.

We continued to walk for many miles, never doubling back, taking in the sights of the trees, vines, birds, and bay.  

It was as we walked through the Royal Botanical Gardens that we heard the terrible, ugly, shrieking sounds of those beautiful cockatoos. Bryan seemed unsurprised that such stunning birds were making such a racket. With a smile he informed me that beautiful birds have ugly calls and plain, drab birds sing beautiful songs. 

We studiously waited until about noon and then gratefully sat down to eat lunch. It had been about seven hours since our breakfast on the plane. We were seated outside and had a view of the water. Bryan had a burger and chips, and I had fish and chips. We were warned to keep an eye on the seagulls. I was therefore ready, or so I thought, when one swooped down above Bryan’s shoulder heading for our table. I “shooed” it and waved my hand directly at it. Unconcerned, it backed off out of the way momentarily and timed its dive perfectly, grabbing and making off with one of Bryan’s largest fries! 

Shortly after leaving the restaurant we found a gelato stand and, as our travel tradition dictates, got ourselves some to enjoy.  There were plenty of dairy free sorbetto flavors to choose from, but I stuck with strawberry which is tried and true.  

We continued to do lots of walking. It was a sunny second day of winter and got up in the high sixties as we walked about. 

Tuckered out from our loong day, we headed back to the hotel for a rest. I noted gratefully that it was still not our planned check in time - God is so good! 

Bryan got his iPad to Chrome Cast to the TV and we happily watched the shows he had downloaded before we left home: Obi-wan Kenobi and Ms. Marvel. 

We forced ourselves not to nap, but instead went out again for dinner. After having fish and chips for lunch, I didn’t want anything greasy. And began to think I didn’t want anything at all, except perhaps plain rice and chicken. 

Bryan found us a Japanese restaurant where we ate teriyaki chicken and rice bowls with chopsticks. Then, as it became dark (though it was not yet even 6PM) we walked back to the hotel to call it a night. 

We have one more day and night in Sydney, and are thinking about seeing the zoo tomorrow. We shall see what the birthday boy wants to do.