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!