Day in Sydney, Australia
A full moon rising over the Sydney Opera House in Sydney, Australia.
It is an uneventful flight of 9 hours from Tokyo to Sydney, unfortunately I get very little sleep and I am loopy as all get out. They did offer ramen on the Quantas flight but it sucked large. I am gonna have to make my own when I get home, stay tuned for the recipe! At the hotel, it is a nap for me, but the guys head right into meetings. We are at the Park Hyatt Hotel nestled directly under the Sydney Harbor Bridge with dead-on views of the Sydney Opera House. The harbor is busy and loud. After a few hours rest I get up and head to the lobby for some fish and chips and a glass of wine. The guys are on their second meeting. I don’t know how they do it.
The Park Hyatt Hotel, the view of the Sydney Opera House, and my fish and chips.
When their meetings end, Bob and I head out for a little shopping, but I don’t last all that long. I go back to the hotel, do quite a bit of writing (the Tokyo Post is giving me a headache), relax on the balcony, then a shower and out for a dinner meeting at Aria. We’ve been here before. Some 14 years ago, when we were married. It is a business dinner. So I make some small talk and then keep quiet. The food here is great. I have a tomato and plum salad followed by a lamb loin with eggplant, chickpeas, a lovely sauce and a side of a velvety potato puree and green salad. Dessert is a vanilla ice cream with strawberry and shortbread. Nightcap at the Cruise Bar and then back to the room to sit on the balcony and enjoy the harbor before headed to bed. Here is a montage of food photos from the evening. I had everybody snapping pictures!
The next morning Bob heads out for a run and I continue to work on the Tokyo Post. So much to write about and so many pictures! Bob returns, showers, and we decide to take the ferry to Manly, 20 minutes away, and do some exploring. The ferry to Manly is a 10 minute walk and leaves every 20 minutes. We get our tickets, board and the ferry leaves 3 minutes later. It is a beautiful day and all the sailboats are out. We arrive in Manly and it is bigger than I imagined! There is a bustling shopping and restaurant scene, but we first make our way to the promenade. The first thing I see is a very large grouping of old but pristine VW busses. There is a Kombi festival and they are sweet! OK, maybe not the last one so much, but it holds its own charm.
We take a few shots and then make our way down the promenade. There are large video screens and loudspeakers with announcers describing something in full detail. It is the last weekend of the Viisla Sydney Pro Surfing tournament, and it is the ladies’ semi-final. We watch and listen to quite a bit of this. The waves are mellow today and it is presenting a challenge. Still fun to watch. We keep walking as the competition is visible from the whole beach.
Next is a string of beach volleyball nets and they are all being used. That, too, is fun to watch. We go to the end of the promenade and then turn around. It is time for lunch. We check out a few restaurants and finally settle in at Whitewater, as there is a table with a view ready for us. We order a glass of white wine and get comfy. There is kangaroo on the menu. We don’t go there. Bob gets a chicken sandwich and I get grilled barramundi with squid ink pasta. The food comes quickly and the pasta turns my tongue green. Nothing a little sparkling water won’t fix! After lunch, we browse the shops a bit and each pick up a new swimsuit. Time to hit the beach. We decide to take a cab to Newport Beach, some 20 minutes away, for sentimental reasons. Here are some images of Manly Harbor and Beach.
We’ve never been to Newport Beach but a friend gifted us two paintings of Newport as a wedding gift, and we wanted to see it for ourselves. I took two shots that mimic the paintings we have. Here they are below.
The Uber driver who got us here raves about Palm Beach, so we decided to try it out. We page another Uber and head 20 minuted north to Palm Beach. The beach is gorgeous, a firm crescent with a lighthouse on a cliff overlooking it. We are thirsty, though. It is wine o’clock. We find Barrenjoey’s and sit at a cafe table on the sidewalk and watch the people go by. It’s now 6:00pm. Time to head back to Manly. We are a good 45 minutes away, but the Uber driver is all too happy to pick us up and take us to town. I call a restaurant we saw earlier, The Pantry, which is the only restaurant on the beach side of the street. It is adorable and has a great wine list. And they have a table available at 7:00pm. We take it. We are feeling snacky, so I order tuna tataki - lightly grilled tuna with pickled beets, shishedo peopers, edamame, fennel and small edible flower blossoms and a soy vinaigrette. Bob gets Chili garlic prawns in a spicy broth with a fresh baguette for dipping. Both are very good.
My amazing salad at The Pantry, Manly Beach, Australia.
We walk back to the ferry which is conveniently pulling in to the pier and leave in no time. A beautiful full orange moon appears on the horizon and Bob takes a photo of it that you see at the beginning of this post. On our way back to the hotel we stop for a nightcap and discuss the day. So cool to serendipitously end up at the beach we have a painting of. Manly was awesome and if/when we come back we would stay there again and ferry into Sydney. Catching a pro surf competition was also amazing. Great day!
Back at the hotel, I don my robe, charge my dead devices and then head to the balcony. Bob gets his drone and heads down to the pier to fly it and take video of the harbor. This footage could either be spectacular, get us arrested or both! He attracts a small crowd while maneuvering the thing across the harbor to the opera house, near the bridge and past the Costa Cruise ship. He wraps it up relatively quickly as he lost it three times. It found its way home. The footage is amazing! I feel I am using that word quite a bit, but it is fitting.
The next morning we rise early as the guys have a 7:30 am meeting and we need to leave at 10:00am for the airport. I pack up my stuff and put my L. A. outfit on - a blousy shirt, white capris and sandals. I grab some breakfast with Bob and Dean when their meeting ends and take one last walk around the harbor before the van comes to sweep us away again. We take off at 12:30pm on Sunday in Sydney and land in LA at 9am Sunday. Air time is 14 hours. Going back in time today. I have no sleep strategy for this one. Probably 3 - 4 hours at the end of the flight. Then a pool cabana with a blankie? Stay tuned to find out.