SUNDAY, 22 MAY 2011 JUST THE TWO OF US (SADLY)

Linda and Hank left at 5 AM for home. We will miss them. Jim and I got up out around 8 AM and walked to the Royal Botanic Garden which is near the Opera House. It is huge, had some beautiful views of the Opera House and Harbour Bridge, and lots of fun flora and fauna.

Mrs. Macquarie's Chair (wife of the first governor)

The Satyr

 

There were cockatoos everywhere

This was there "watering hole" where they drank from the water leaking out of the faucet

They would dig up roots from the grass so I decided to help them...quite tame and unafraid

The most surprising thing was colony of Spectacled Flying Foxes aka Fruit Bats. They are huge. They were mostly sleeping, but every so often you would here a few of them fighting, some would stretch their wings, and every so often fly around.

Next we hopped on a ferry to Taronga Zoo and back so Jim could get some more pictures of the Harbour Bridge and Opera House with the morning sunlight.  

Then we hopped on a bus and headed for Bondi Beach (love this 7 day pass!) 

Entrance to Luna Park

After lunch it was on another ferry to Darling Harbour which went under the Harbour Bridge for photo ops with the afternoon sun. 

Once we got back to Circular Quay we walked up to the bridge pylon to get a view.

Now the ticket tells you there are 200 steps to climb to get to the top...what it doesn’t mention is the 200+ steps it takes to get from the surface streets up to the base of the pylon. There were lots of threatening clouds, and Jim was afraid there would be no sun to take pictures with, but alas, the weather gods were with us, and as we got to the top the sun came through a break in the clouds and shined the whole time we were up there.

But there were too many for a nice sunset, and it was dull and gray, not like we saw when we did the Bridge Climb.

I have never mentioned the “sticker shock” we have had here when it comes to food prices. A can of Coke costs $4 in the store. We thought we would find a Pizza Hut or Dominoes and have a decent size pizza for a halfway decent price...silly us. There is a Pizza Hut down the street we walked to...small pizzas are 9" for $11, mediums are 11" for $15. We were going to suck it up and order two, but there credit card machine was “broken” and we didn’t have enough cash left, so we ate at Hungry Jacks, which is really Burger King.