The Land Down Under - Part 3

Day 4:

We spent our last full day exploring Sydney!  After our parking difficulties the day before, we decided we didn't want to deal with the hassle and just took a bus into the city.  It was pretty convenient and way, way cheaper than paying to park in the city.

Our first stop was Circular Quay, right by the Sydney Harbor Bridge and the Opera House.  

Sydney Harbor Bridge

Sydney Opera House

A view of the city and Circular Quay from the Opera House

After strolling around the area and checking out the opera house (which has really awesome bathrooms by the way :), we headed over to the Royal Botanic Gardens.

Here we found an awesome picturesque location!  It was perfect to just sit and enjoy the view for a little while.

*Side Note:  Please ignore the awfulness of my bangs... The first morning in Australia there was a little battle between my hair straightener and the outlet adapter... unfortunately the outlet won :(  I don't know exactly what happened but I will tell you that there were sparks, a small explosion, fried bangs, and a dead straightener.

I was in love with this spot :)

Another great view of the city skyscrapers (all the green area in front is part of the Botanic Gardens)

A water fountain in the gardens

I loved these trees!  They were crazy cool.

After exploring as much of the gardens as we could we walked down a street past these amazing old buildings with beautiful architecture! The Parliament House, hospital, and St. Mary's church (in picture).  

We then headed down Market Street which is a busy shopping street full of high class stores and restaurants.  On our way to Darling Harbor we also stopped by the Queen Victoria Building, which is another beautiful old building that's been turned into a mall.  It also had free wi-fi which came in handy later on.

Darling Harbor is another great little area with lots to keep the tourists busy.  We had fun walking around looking at everything.  Birds and seagulls were everywhere and we were constantly paranoid that they would poop on us.  We had sat down for only 2 seconds before a kind seagull dropped a present on my leg... thanks.  Though I am grateful it wasn't my head!

We walked all the way back to Circular Quay to eat some dinner but we weren't really paying attention to where we were going and ended up taking a LONG way there... we were both wearing flip-flops and our poor feet were beginning to throb after hours and hours of walking.

We found out that there was going to be a big light show going on after dark in Darling Harbor so we wanted to once again walk back there to see it (I know, I know we definitely could've planned a little better ha ha)... However Jeff looked like a cripple hobbling along and we didn't think he would survive the long walk back.  That's when a miracle happened and we discovered that there was a free bus going between the two!     

We watched the light show in the rain then finished off the night with some yummmmy gelato!  

Not quite as cool as the Bellagio Fountain or DisneyLand... but still a neat little show!

We had an interesting time trying to get back to our hotel that night... it's kind of a long story, but I'll tell you that it involved scrounging/begging for change, both of us assuming the other had the debit card, and thinking we finally had the right amount of change then finding out we were still 2 dollars short.  I was beginning to think that we were stuck... ha ha.  That's when another miracle happened and we discovered a store where we could use our credit card to purchase tickets!  Ha ha... Good times :)

The next morning we woke up and headed out to the airport.  We had some seriously bad traffic on the way and we were sprinting to the car rental office so we wouldn't get charged for an extra day... we made it with exactly ONE minute to spare!  Ha ha!  Vacations are fun :)

Anyway it was a long day - or two days I guess - coming home... We left on Sunday afternoon and got back to the states Sunday morning ha!  Pretty crazy.  It took us a few days to readjust to Utah time again.  We found ourselves wide awake at 1:00 am.  But it was totally worth it!  I loved everything about our trip and Sydney is such a cool city!

The Land Down Under - Part 2

Day 3:

After two days enjoying the Blue Mountains, we headed back to Sydney!

 On our drive back we stopped at Wentworth Falls!  Once again the position of the sun was bad and this picture doesn't do it justice.  And what you can't see is that the cliff actually goes waaayy farther down!  Cool little waterfall!

We had to hike a ways down to get these good views

Our next stop was Featherdale Wild Life Park!!  A small little zoo, but so fun with lots of hands-on experiences!  We loved it!

 Cute little wallabies!

 Cockatoos!  We saw wild cockatoos all over Sydney.

"Kookaburra sits in an old gum tree"

(one of the many songs stuck in my head the whole time we were there ha ha)

 They had tons and tons of adorable koalas!  

This zoo began by rescuing the koalas and breeding them.

 They had a few large enclosed areas where the kangaroos and wallabies were just roaming free and you could pet and feed them!  This huge emu was a little scary... I tried to avoid him.

 This one was our favorite!  He was super soft.

One big Croc!

 Wombats

 Big Kangaroo.  Check out those claws....

 Feeding the Wallabies

 We had so much fun watching these wallabies, especially when we realized that many of them were carrying tiny joeys in their pouches!  This little guy got a little too curious and tumbled right out of the comfort of his mother's pouch.  We got a good look at his tiny body as he anxiously tried to figure out how to get back to in.  So cute!

Little heads popping out everywhere!

 The main attraction of this zoo is that they let you "cuddle with the koalas," so we got to pet them and get pictures.  We were hoping to get to hold a koala, but it's illegal in New South Wales, so... I guess we'll just have to make trip up to Brisbane sometime :)

Dingo!!  So cute!  I wanted to take him home with me.

These koalas were in the nursery area which was separate from all the others.  Just before leaving we found out that they had little joeys in their pouches as well so we ran over there to see if we could catch one popping out... and sure enough we saw the tiniest little arm dangling out of the koala on the right!!  And then out came an itty-bitty furry head!  Ah it was SO cool to see!  

I didn't get any pictures of the joey, but we had fun watching these koalas during dinner time when they were actually active and moving around.  Apparently they sleep like 20 hours a day... ha ha.  What a life :)

After the zoo, we finally made it back to Sydney and finished off our day with a beautiful beach sunset!  It took us like an hour just to park.  First, the parking meters wouldn't accept our cards, so we had to go find an atm to get cash, and then find a bank to get change to put money in the meter... yeah it was fun.

  

Bondi Beach

After the sun set we walked along the beachfront checking out all the different shops and sampling gelato!  Bondi is the biggest beach in Sydney and the most popular, though the chilly weather seemed to scare everyone away since there weren't very many people there.... thankfully. I like to enjoy my vacations without all the tourist crowds.

We headed back to our hotel and had a quick dinner at the hotel's restaurant.  Our waiter was a super friendly Italian-Australian man who, if you didn't know was Italian, you would've thought he was drunk.  Ha ha.  Funny guy indeed.  He kept us very entertained throughout our meal.  

And I bet you can guess what time we went to bed this night...?  Yup, about 8:30 again :) (Just to give you some more perspective... 8:00 pm in Sydney is about 4:00 am the day before)

The Land Down Under - Part 1

Last month was filled with training and tests for Jeff which made his schedule kind of skee-wompus.  However, because of that he ended up with nearly a whole week off at the end of the month!!  We knew we had to take advantage of those rare 6 days off... so we took a vacation to Sydney, Australia!

(PS get ready for a blog post bombardment!)

 Day 1:

We met up in LA on Monday night (Jeff had to work that morning), then got on our plane about 11:30 pm.  After 13 hours of flying we reached Sydney... sort of.  Due to fog we couldn't land, so our plane circled around for a while then had to divert up to Brisbane.  We landed there, sat on the ground for about an hour and a half, then finally headed back to Sydney.  Another hour in the air and we finally arrived in Sydney.... on Wednesday afternoon!  Yup, we just skipped Tuesday completely.  Kinda' crazy ha ha!

So our already long 13 hour flight turned into a 17 hour flight.  It messed up our plans a little bit, but not too bad.  We "hired a car" and headed out to the Blue Mountains about an hour inland from Sydney.  These mountains were breathtakingly beautiful and we were trying to soak up every inch of the scenery as we drove through!   

 Ahhh!  Driving on the left side of the road... a new experience for Jeff!  He was pretty scared but did great.  The best part was every time we made a right turn the windshield wipers started going :) (the wipers and signal switches were opposite ha ha)

Our first stop was the Mount Tomah Botanic Gardens.  

Since it's currently Fall-turning-Winter in Australia the sun set about 5:00 pm every night, so that was kind of a bummer... but we did get to experience some beautiful Fall colors!  We were already losing our sun light by this point so we wandered through the small gardens quickly then headed back out on the road. 

We made one last stop at a lookout point (and hiked down the mountain a little ways), before making it to Katoomba where we checked into our hotel.  Despite getting a pretty good nights rest on the plane the night before, we c-r-a-s-h-e-d.... HARD.  The second we got into the room we gravitated to the bed.  Laying there I realized how hungry I was, so I asked if we could get something to eat.  Jeff moaned and groaned and said "yeah........ let's go."  I moaned and groaned, but could not get my body off that bed.  Next thing we know... it was morning! :)  And it had only been 6:00 pm... ha ha!

Day 2:

We decided to take a scenic loop the took us out into the country side where we saw beautiful rolling hills and fields, more fall colors, and lots and lots of cows and sheep.  It took us a little while longer than we had thought, but it became totally worth it once we saw our first wild Kangaroos!!!  We also saw a lot of dead kangaroos and wallabies off the side of the road... apparently they are like the deer of Australia.  

 On our way into the country side, we stopped at Evan's lookout... and WOW.  It literally took my breath away!  This picture does not do it justice.

Along our route we came across the Jenolan Caves.  We didn't know anything about it other than how expensive it was to take the tours through all the caves, but we checked it out anyway.  Turns out we got to see a lot of cool things just walking around, and didn't have to spend a dime!

 Carlotta Arch

 The Grand Arch (which we also got to drive through!)

This arch was more like a short tunnel with a few of the cave entrances inside. 

Inside The Devil's Coach House

We did a little bushwalking along this river walk trail and was pleasantly surprised by what we found...

 The beautiful Blue Lake!  

(that is actually how blue the water really was, and it was super clear too)

 We were thinking about turning around and then decided "oh we'll just go a little further."  I'm so glad we did or else we would've missed this pretty little waterfall!

We ate lunch at the caves (amongst some beautiful parrots) and then finished our long scenic route, taking us back to Katoomba.  With our last bits of sunlight we headed out to Echo Point.

 Here we got a great view of the Blue Mountains and "The Three Sisters" rock formations.

We drove back to our previous night's hotel and sat in the parking lot using their free wifi so that we could find and book another hotel for the night ha ha.  (we always kept our look out for free wifi spots :)  We thought about just doing that one again, but then we found a way better hotel close to katoomba that was cheaper too.

For dinner we went to an Australian restaurant where Jeff ordered a Kangaroo Burger (not very good...) and I got a chicken schnitzel burger.  Yes I know schnitzel is not Australian, but I'd never had it before so I thought I'd try it.  And since it's one of Maria's favorite things, I figured it had to be good ;)

And once again, we passed out as soon as our heads made contact with our pillows about 8 o'clock that night.  The time change affected us way more than we actually thought it would!

Celebrations!

This last weekend Jeff, my parents and I celebrated Jeff's new transfer to Salt Lake by going out to eat at Pizza Pie Cafe.  It was yummy!  Though with their wide variety of types of pizzas I usually end up regretting eating there... ha ha.  I just want to try them all!  And I especially can't resist the dessert pizzas... Mmmm Yum!  After our mini celebration Jeff and I headed to one of his friends wedding receptions.  

Saturday night we got together with my Best Cousin Jen, and her hubby Trevor!  We had dinner at their place then went mini golfing at Mulligan's.  Golfing was followed by dessert... fruit pizza cookies that I made.  Mmmm yum!  

We had a blast chatting and catching up all night, and getting to know Trevor a little better!

A Tribute To The Cutest Pilot I Know

It was one year ago that Jeff was just beginning weeks of exhaustive and stressful training.  Now here we are, having officially survived that dreaded first year of a regional airline pilot career.  It's certainly been an adventure, and yes, at times quite stressful, but we survived. 

I can't think of a better way to celebrate one year than for Jeff to FINALLY be transferred to Salt Lake City!!!!!  

I couldn't help but shed tears of joy!  After one very long year of waiting for this, and Jeff suffering through commuting, the day has finally come.
(and perfect timing too... now that Palm Springs, CA has reached it's 110 degrees days... Yuck!)

 I know it hasn't been easy and it's certainly added a few gray hairs to his head... but I'm so grateful for Jeff and his patience, perseverance, and hard work while bearing through the stress and less desirable aspects of his career!  I love my pilot.  

Beginning July 1st Jeff will be based right here in Salt Lake.  We are thrilled!  So much relief and so much gratitude. 

It's a good day.

A Full House

I meant to upload these pictures before we left on vacation, but I ran out of time and the internet at LAX was not cooperating... so these are kinda' old, but I still wanted to share them.

My sister came up a couple weekends ago with all four of her kids so that Danny could work on the shelves in their library.  Jeff happened to have the weekend off as well, so he spent a lot of time entertaining the girls!  We found a bug catcher and they spent hours looking for bugs on Sunday.  They loved it!  It was pretty cute to watch.

 Uncle Jeff teaching the ways of "bug catching"

The typical child's response to "Show me what you've got" ha ha.  Right in front of the face :)

Most of the collection consisted of Rolly-Pollys (or potato bugs as I've always called them), and they made sure to put lots of yummy leaves and things in there for them to eat.

 Brooke and Carlie came out to join us as well!  I didn't get any pictures of Brooke because she was too busy gnawing on her hand/toys.

 Carlie's cute scrunchy face ha ha

 Sweet little Brynlee

 Grandma and her girls!  We attempted one with Lex and Bryn as well, but all we got were frowns ha ha.

But we got some cute smiles thanks to a silly Jeff

Also on Sunday, Mike and Maridee came up and we had family dinner.  It was a full house as you can imagine, but a blast as always!  Man our family just keeps getting bigger and bigger.